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Historic Pacific Northwest Heatwave of 2021


donsutherland1
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Weather summary
for Alberta
issued by Environment Canada
at 4:06 a.m. MDT Friday 2 July 2021.

Discussion.

The following areas set a daily maximum temperature record on July 
1, 2021: 

Athabasca Area 
New record of 35.1 
Old record of 33.3 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1900 

Banff Area 
New record of 35.6 
Old record of 31.6 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1887 

Barrhead Area 
New record of 36.5 
Old record of 34.4 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1912 

Bow Island Area 
New record of 37.0 
Old record of 32.4 set in 2017 
Records in this area have been kept since 1961 

Bow Valley (Provincial Park) Area 
New record of 37.6 
Old record of 30.4 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1928 

Breton Area 
New record of 35.0 
Old record of 28.3 set in 1942 
Records in this area have been kept since 1939 

Brooks Area 
New record of 37.3 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1912 

Calgary Area 
New record of 36.3 
Old record of 32.8 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1881 

Camrose Area 
New record of 33.5 
Old record of 32.8 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1921 

Cardston Area 
New record of 35.4 
Old record of 31.0 set in 1985 
Records in this area have been kept since 1918 

Claresholm Area 
New record of 36.6 
Old record of 32.0 set in 1985 
Records in this area have been kept since 1951 

Cold Lake Area 
New record of 34.8 
Old record of 29.7 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1952 

Coronation Area 
New record of 37.2 
Old record of 33.3 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1912 

Crowsnest Area 
New record of 33.8 
Old record of 29.5 set in 1987 
Records in this area have been kept since 1965 

Drumheller Area 
New record of 38.8 
Old record of 33.3 set in 1977 
Records in this area have been kept since 1923 

Edmonton (int'l Aprt) Area 
New record of 32.9 
Old record of 27.4 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1959 

Elk Island (National Park) Area 
New record of 32.7 
Old record of 29.1 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1966 

Esther Area 
New record of 38.8 
Old record of 29.8 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1985 

Fort Chipewyan Area 
New record of 36.1 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1926 
Records in this area have been kept since 1883 

Fort Mcmurray Area 
New record of 37.9 
Old record of 35.0 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1908 

Hendrickson Creek Area 
New record of 31.6 
Old record of 30.1 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1995 

High River Area 
New record of 36.3 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1913 

Highvale Area 
New record of 35.9 
Old record of 28.5 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1977 

Jasper Area 
New record of 39.4 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1916 

Lethbridge Area 
New record of 37.9 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1904 
Records in this area have been kept since 1902 

Lloydminster Area 
New record of 34.4 
Old record of 30.6 set in 1928 
Records in this area have been kept since 1904 

Medicine Hat Area 
New record of 39.5 
Old record of 35.4 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1883 

Lac La Biche Area 
New record of 33.9 
Old record of 29.5 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1944 

Mildred Lake Area 
New record of 38.2 
Old record of 33.1 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1965 

Milk River Area 
New record of 36.7 
Old record of 31.9 set in 2017 
Records in this area have been kept since 1994 

Nordegg Area 
New record of 35.6 
Old record of 31.7 set in 1924 
Records in this area have been kept since 1915 

Onefour Area 
New record of 37.7 
Old record of 36.0 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1928 

Pincher Creek Area 
New record of 35.0 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1904 
Records in this area have been kept since 1893 

Red Earth Creek Area 
New record of 37.8 
Old record of 32.4 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1994 

Rocky Mountain House Area 
New record of 34.9 
Old record of 30.6 set in 1942 
Records in this area have been kept since 1915 

Slave Lake Area 
New record of 35.7 
Old record of 31.1 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1922 

Stettler Area 
New record of 36.2 
Old record of 29.0 set in 1977 
Records in this area have been kept since 1918 

Stony Plain Area 
New record of 34.8 
Old record of 27.6 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1966 

Strathmore Area 
New record of 35.3 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1918 
Records in this area have been kept since 1912 

Sundre Area 
New record of 35.2 
Old record of 28.2 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1993 

Taber Area 
New record of 36.0 
Old record of 33.0 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1947 

Vegreville Area 
New record of 33.7 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1940 
Records in this area have been kept since 1918 

Wainwright Area 
New record of 35.9 
Old record of 30.5 set in 1977 
Records in this area have been kept since 1966 

Waterton Park Area 
New record of 34.4 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1985 
Records in this area have been kept since 1976 

Note: the temperature records reported here have been derived from a 
selection of historical stations in each geographic area that were 
active during the period of record.

Please note that this summary may contain preliminary or unofficial 
information and does not constitute a complete or final report.

End/PASPC
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Weather summary
for Manitoba
issued by Environment Canada
at 4:05 a.m. CDT Friday 2 July 2021.

Discussion.

The following areas set or tied a daily maximum temperature record 
on July 1, 2021: 

Churchill Area (Churchill Climate) 
New record of 34.1 
Old record of 31.1 set in 1976 
Records in this area have been kept since 1929 

Gillam Area (Gillam A) 
Tied record of 34.4 set in 1989 
Records in this area have been kept since 1943 

Lynn Lake Area (Lynn Lake RCS) 
New record of 38.0 
Old record of 30.4 set in 1981 
Records in this area have been kept since 1952 

Steinbach Area (Kleefeld (MAFRI)) 
New record of 30.9 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1989 
Records in this area have been kept since 1956 

Swan River Area (Swan River RCS) 
New record of 33.4 
Old record of 33.0 set in 1981 
Records in this area have been kept since 1960 

Thompson Area (Thompson A) 
New record of 34.7 
Old record of 33.1 set in 1989 
Records in this area have been kept since 1966 

Note: the temperature records reported here have been derived from a 
selection of historical stations in each geographic area that were 
active during the period of record.

Please note that this summary may contain preliminary or unofficial 
information and does not constitute a complete or final report.

End/PASPC
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28 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

The exxon thing really got to me, they actually think they can keep using this stuff indefinitely?

They need to be taxed into oblivion.

And everyone should buy electric cars.

 

Accelerate the development of technology to create, cleanly, affordable electric power. Subsidize the transformation of heating/cooling systems to clean use energy including safe atomic, perhaps fusion, natural wind and tidal motion. Pipe dreams, perhaps, but is there a choice?  Either way some kind of change will occur. I believe in my NYC Big Bird paradise and others you will need, in a  a decade or two, a permit just to own a car. Electric only, in city. Exceptions in size for families. For the lone or couple drivers, I believe there is an electric smart car in your future and only permit parking permitted on all city streets. If (ahem) rapid transit does not rise to the occasion I rather not think of the outcome. A lot of $’s generated for the city if we have any to spend. As always ….

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Weather summary
for Saskatchewan
issued by Environment Canada
at 3:55 a.m. CST Friday 2 July 2021.

Discussion.

The following areas set a daily maximum temperature record on July 
1, 2021: 

Assiniboia Area (Assiniboia Airport) 
New record of 33.7 
Old record of 31.5 set in 1985 
Records in this area have been kept since 1965 

Buffalo Narrows Area (Buffalo Narrows (AUT)) 
New record of 34.0 
Old record of 31.0 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1962 

Collins Bay Area (Collins Bay Sk) 
New record of 37.2 
Old record of 31.5 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1972 

Coronach Area (Coronach SPC) 
New record of 34.8 
Old record of 33.0 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1961 

Cypress Hills (Provincial Park) Area (Cypress Hills Park) 
New record of 32.6 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1918 

Elbow Area (Elbow CS) 
New record of 34.2 
Old record of 32.4 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1955 

Key Lake Area (Key Lake) 
New record of 36.7 
Old record of 30.6 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1976 

Kindersley Area (Kindersley A) 
New record of 37.8 
Old record of 36.7 set in 1944 
Records in this area have been kept since 1942 

La Ronge Area (La Ronge RCS) 
New record of 33.8 
Old record of 30.6 set in 1976 
Records in this area have been kept since 1923 

Last Mountain Lake (Sanctuary) Area (Last Mountain CS) 
New record of 33.9 
Old record of 32.0 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1975 

Leader Area (Leader Airport) 
New record of 38.5 
Old record of 37.2 set in 1936 
Records in this area have been kept since 1924 

Lucky Lake Area (Lucky Lake) 
New record of 35.0 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1976 
Records in this area have been kept since 1972 

Maple Creek Area (Maple Creek) 
New record of 37.6 
Old record of 34.4 set in 1937 
Records in this area have been kept since 1915 

Meadow Lake Area (Meadow Lake) 
New record of 34.2 
Old record of 28.6 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1959 

North Battleford Area (North Battleford RCS) 
New record of 35.5 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1914 
Records in this area have been kept since 1879 

Prince Albert Area (Prince Albert Glass Field) 
New record of 33.2 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1885 
Records in this area have been kept since 1884 

Rockglen Area (Rockglen (AUT)) 
New record of 33.7 
Old record of 30.7 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1970 

Rosetown Area (Rosetown East) 
New record of 36.4 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1937 
Records in this area have been kept since 1913 

Saskatoon Area (Saskatoon RCS) 
New record of 35.4 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1962 
Records in this area have been kept since 1900 

Scott Area (Scott CDA) 
New record of 35.5 
Old record of 32.8 set in 1948 
Records in this area have been kept since 1911 

Southend Reindeer Area (Southend) 
New record of 35.6 
Old record of 31.5 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1938 

Stony Rapids Area (Stony Rapids) 
New record of 38.5 
Old record of 31.8 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1960 

Swift Current Area (Swift Current CDA) 
New record of 35.2 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1937 
Records in this area have been kept since 1885 

Waskesiu Lake Area (Waskesiu Lake) 
New record of 32.6 
Old record of 28.9 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1966 

Watrous Area (Watrous East) 
New record of 33.4 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1988 
Records in this area have been kept since 1953 

Wynyard Area (Wynyard (AUT)) 
New record of 32.5 
Old record of 29.8 set in 1988 
Records in this area have been kept since 1964 

Note: the temperature records reported here have been derived from a 
selection of historical stations in each geographic area that were 
active during the period of record.

Please note that this summary may contain preliminary or unofficial 
information and does not constitute a complete or final report.

End/PASPC
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3 hours ago, TimB84 said:

Here’s the thing. The area affected by this heatwave is about 1/360 of the earth’s land area (I used the area of Washington and Oregon as an estimate - I know there were parts of Canada affected too, so that’s probably a lowball estimate). But for the sake of argument, let’s say this was a 50,000 year event on average. If you divide the earth into 360 equal parcels of land and OR/WA is one of them, you would expect one of these parcels to experience a 1-in-50,000 year event about once every 50,000/360 = 140 years. But I feel like I’ve read in this thread that the Siberia event last year was also of similar magnitude (and did someone say the March 2012 event in the Midwest?). So instead of once every 140 years, we’ve now had it happen to 3 of these 360 parcels of land in 9 years. That’s statistically significant and a strong indicator that the dice are loaded.

Your numbers are fairly consistent with my suggestion it's a 1 in 15,000 year event on a current baseline. I think it was more like a 1 in 200,000 year event on mid 20th century baseline. So it's even more of a loading (10x+).

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Excerpts from the World Meteorological Organization:

An exceptional and dangerous heatwave is baking the Northwestern USA and Western Canada in areas which are more synonymous with the cold. Temperatures have reached more than 45.0°C on consecutive days, with extremely warm nights in between…

These early summer hot weather conditions are taking place in human-induced climate change background, with global temperatures are already 1.2°C higher than the pre-industrial levels.

“Heatwaves are becoming more frequent and intense as greenhouse gas concentrations lead to a rise in global temperatures. We are also noticing that they are starting earlier and ending later and are taking an increasing toll on human health,” said Omar Baddour, Head of WMO’s Climate Monitoring and Policy Division.

Nikos Christidis is a climate scientist with the UK’s Met Office. He said: “Without human-induced climate change, it would have been almost impossible to hit such record-breaking mean June temperatures in the Western United States as the chances of natural occurrence is once every tens of thousands of years. In the present-day climate getting an extremely hot June is common and is likely to occur twice in three decades. However, an analysis from many computer models suggests that by the end of the century these extreme temperatures are more likely than not. Human influence is estimated to have increased the likelihood of a new record several thousand times,” he said.

https://public.wmo.int/en/media/news/june-ends-exceptional-heat

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https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2021/07/western-canada-burns-and-deaths-mount-after-worlds-most-extreme-heat-wave-in-modern-history/

This is the most anomalous regional extreme heat event to occur anywhere on Earth since temperature records began. Nothing can compare,” said weather historian Christopher Burt, author of the book “Extreme Weather.”

Pointing to Lytton, Canada, he added, “There has never been a national heat record in a country with an extensive period of record and a multitude of observation sites that was beaten by 7°F to 8°F.”

International weather records researcher Maximiliano Herrera (@extremetemps) agrees. “What we are seeing now is totally unprecedented worldwide,” said Herrera, who tweeted on June 30, “It’s an endless waterfall of records being smashed.”

Some examples of the extremity of this event, based on preliminary data:

• Portland, Oregon, broke its longstanding all-time record high (107°F from 1965 and 1981) on three days in a row – a stunning feat for any all-time record – with highs of 108°F on Saturday, June 26; 112°F on Sunday; and 116°F on Monday. That 116°F is one degree higher than the average daily high on June 28 at Death Valley, California.

• Quillayute, Washington, broke its official all-time high by a truly astonishing 11°F, after hitting 110°F on Monday (old record: 99°F on August 9, 1981). Quillayute is located near the lush Hoh Rain Forest on the Olympic Peninsula, just three miles from the Pacific Ocean, and receives an average of 100 inches of precipitation per year.

 Jasper, Alberta, broke its all-time high of 36.7°C (98.1°F) on four days in a row, June 27-30, with highs of 37.3°C, 39.0°C, 40.3°C, and 41.1°C (99.1°F, 102.2°F, 104.5°F, and 106°F).

• All-time state highs were tied in Washington (118°F at Dallesport) and set in Oregon (118°F at Hermiston, beating the reliable record of 117°F), and provincial highs were smashed in British Columbia (49.6°C at Lytton, beating 39.1°C) and Northwest Territories (39.9°C at Fort Smith, beating 31.7°C).

According to Herrera, more all-time heat records have been broken by at least 5°C (9°F) in the past week’s heat wave than in the previous 84-plus years of world weather recordkeeping, going back to July 1936. It’s worth noting that the record North American heat of the 1930s, including 1936, was largely connected to the Dust Bowl, in which the effects of a multiyear drought were amplified by over-plowed, denuded soil across the Great Plains – an example of human-induced climate change itself, albeit temporary.

Preliminary data from NOAA’s U.S. Records website shows that 55 U.S. stations had the highest temperatures in their history in the week ending June 28. More than 400 daily record highs were set. Over the past year, the nation has experienced about 38,000 daily record highs versus about 18,500 record lows, consistent with the 2:1 ratio of hot to cold records set in recent years.

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2 hours ago, skierinvermont said:

Your numbers are fairly consistent with my suggestion it's a 1 in 15,000 year event on a current baseline. I think it was more like a 1 in 200,000 year event on mid 20th century baseline. So it's even more of a loading (10x+).

I'd question that, Mann was on today and he said it was a once in a millenium event, that may now be a once in 10 year event due to climate change.  He also said using the "new normal" phrase wasn't accurate, because this is a moving target and still changing (that is, accelerated climate change is occurring.)

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1 hour ago, donsutherland1 said:

Excerpts from the World Meteorological Organization:

An exceptional and dangerous heatwave is baking the Northwestern USA and Western Canada in areas which are more synonymous with the cold. Temperatures have reached more than 45.0°C on consecutive days, with extremely warm nights in between…

These early summer hot weather conditions are taking place in human-induced climate change background, with global temperatures are already 1.2°C higher than the pre-industrial levels.

“Heatwaves are becoming more frequent and intense as greenhouse gas concentrations lead to a rise in global temperatures. We are also noticing that they are starting earlier and ending later and are taking an increasing toll on human health,” said Omar Baddour, Head of WMO’s Climate Monitoring and Policy Division.

Nikos Christidis is a climate scientist with the UK’s Met Office. He said: “Without human-induced climate change, it would have been almost impossible to hit such record-breaking mean June temperatures in the Western United States as the chances of natural occurrence is once every tens of thousands of years. In the present-day climate getting an extremely hot June is common and is likely to occur twice in three decades. However, an analysis from many computer models suggests that by the end of the century these extreme temperatures are more likely than not. Human influence is estimated to have increased the likelihood of a new record several thousand times,” he said.

https://public.wmo.int/en/media/news/june-ends-exceptional-heat

So Mann may be right in what he said today.  And the chances of this occurring by the end of the century are more than 50% per year?  But it's already 50% twice in 30 years?  Hmmm, so my estimate of 50/50 once in a decade isn't far off....

 

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34 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

I'd question that, Mann was on today and he said it was a once in a millenium event, that may now be a once in 10 year event due to climate change.  He also said using the "new normal" phrase wasn't accurate, because this is a moving target and still changing (that is, accelerated climate change is occurring.)

I'm guessing Mann is speaking of something different than you. My guess is he's saying breaking 20th century records by 8+ degrees anywhere on earth may become a 1 in 10 year event. 

But we were discussing the probability of specifically Portland OR hitting 116 again. 

Two very different things. On a global scale, for any location to beat their previous record by 8+ degrees, this was a 1 in 1000 year event and now I could see it being a 1 in 100 at present and soon to be 1 in 10. But for Portland specifically to break their 20th century recrod by 8 degrees was a 1 in 200,000 year event that may be a 1 in 15,000 at present and 1 in 50 or 1 in 100 by the time I die (~2080).

That's why Mann said 1 in 1000 soon to be 1 in 10 because he's talking about anywhere having these kinds of anomalies. For Portland specifically to have an anomaly like this was 1 in 200,000, now 1 in 15,000.

 

If that's not what Mann was saying then he's just wrong. This was way less likely than 1 in a millenium. And it's also not going to become 1 in 10 any time soon.

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39 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

So Mann may be right in what he said today.  And the chances of this occurring by the end of the century are more than 50% per year?  But it's already 50% twice in 30 years?  Hmmm, so my estimate of 50/50 once in a decade isn't far off....

 

No.. see above... Mann must be talking about beating 20th century records anywhere by 8F... not specifically Portland OR.

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1 minute ago, skierinvermont said:

I'm guessing Mann is speaking of something different than you. My guess is he's saying breaking 20th century records by 8+ degrees anywhere on earth may become a 1 in 10 year event. 

But we were discussing the probability of specifically Portland OR hitting 116 again. 

Two very different things. On a global scale, for any location to beat their previous record by 8+ degrees, this was a 1 in 1000 year event and now I could see it being a 1 in 100 at present and soon to be 1 in 10. But for Portland specifically to break their 20th century recrod by 8 degrees was a 1 in 200,000 year event that may be a 1 in 15,000 at present and 1 in 50 or 1 in 100 by the time I die (~2080).

That's why Mann said 1 in 1000 soon to be 1 in 10 because he's talking about anywhere having these kinds of anomalies. For Portland specifically to have an anomaly like this was 1 in 200,000, now 1 in 15,000.

 

If that's not what Mann was saying then he's just wrong. This was way less likely than 1 in a millenium. And it's also not going to become 1 in 10 any time soon.

Yes exactly- I think thats what the NWS was talking about in the excerpt posted by Don.  Not for any specific location but globally it'll be a one in 10 year event soon.

But I also saw you say that by the end of your life (let's just use 2100), you think this could be a 1 in 10 year event even specifically for the PNW?

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Just now, LibertyBell said:

Yes exactly- I think thats what the NWS was talking about in the excerpt posted by Don.  Not for any specific location but globally it'll be a one in 10 year event soon.

But I also saw you say that by the end of your life (let's just use 2100), you think this could be a 1 in 10 year event even specifically for the PNW?

I think I guessed 1 in 50 years by 2080.

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9 minutes ago, skierinvermont said:

I think I guessed 1 in 50 years by 2080.

Under a BAU scenario

And they would see ~112 every few years

It's not hard stuff... you just shift the distribution upwards by the expected daytime summer warming in that region. Maybe broaden the distribution slightly if the wavy jet hypothesis is correct.

If you shift the distribution by 1 standard deviation* (~4F I'm guessing), then a 4.37 sigma event becomes a 3.37 sigma event. If you broaden the distribution slightly then it becomes a ~3.0 sigma event.

*NOTE this is the standard deviation of annual maximum temperature, not daily high temperature

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11 minutes ago, skierinvermont said:

Under a BAU scenario

And they would see ~112 every few years

It's not hard stuff... you just shift the distribution upwards by the expected daytime summer warming in that region. Maybe broaden the distribution slightly if the wavy jet hypothesis is correct.

If you shift the distribution by 1 standard deviation (~7F I'm guessing), then a 4.37 sigma event becomes a 3.37 sigma event. If you broaden the distribution slightly then it becomes a ~3.0 sigma event.

Yeah I remember doing this kind of work with bell curves lol.

You just need to know what the value of 1 SD is and calculate the rest accordingly.

I always thought that normals should be calculated this way- anything outside +/- 1 SD should be deemed above or below normal, not the strictly linear method we use now.

 

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1 minute ago, LibertyBell said:

Yeah I remember doing this kind of work with bell curves lol.

You just need to know what each SD is and calculate the rest accordingly.

I always thought that normals should be calculated this way- anything outside +/- 1 SD should be deemed above or below normal, not the strictly linear methods we use now.

 

see my edit (4F not 7F) and note

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This won't sound altogether cogently scientific, admittedly .. but, I get the weird 'feeling' this is ...sort of an introduction ceremony into a new climate realm where this occurrence takes place in certain regions with more ease than those staggering odds implicate in rareness. 

I have some analytic reasons for that, but I am trying to limit my verbosity in social media; in an increasingly patience reducing/aversion to spending that much time with it, it's wasting time.

In short, there are regions of the planet that favor "synergistic" results. Those by convention ( being more than the sum of the contributing forces ...) will exceed the mean standard deviation models - by these exotic ranges, more readily so than regions that do not have feed-backs.  Those location will be able to get those +8 and +10 oddities over that base-line numerical/statistical layout.  The Pac NW is one of those regions.  I think the Pac NW and also San Francisco and L.A. can do this again sooner than we think. The shit with fires and heat last summer ?  that was no fluke and is related - whether the scalar values of the extremes match or not.  And I would tend to assert that the aggregate speaks to the real state of the 'rareness' - I.e. not as much so as we may think.

 

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12 minutes ago, skierinvermont said:

Under a BAU scenario

And they would see ~112 every few years

It's not hard stuff... you just shift the distribution upwards by the expected daytime summer warming in that region. Maybe broaden the distribution slightly if the wavy jet hypothesis is correct.

If you shift the distribution by 1 standard deviation* (~4F I'm guessing), then a 4.37 sigma event becomes a 3.37 sigma event. If you broaden the distribution slightly then it becomes a ~3.0 sigma event.

*NOTE this is the standard deviation of annual maximum temperature, not daily high temperature

Making a separate post regarding your edit.  Right, because we want to find the likelihood of an all-time record high temperature.  So the variance should be much less than it would be for a daily high.

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13 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

This won't sound altogether cogently scientific, admittedly .. but, I get the weird 'feeling' this is ...sort of an introduction ceremony into a new climate realm featuring this sort of occurrence with more ease than those staggering odds implicate in rareness. 

I have some analytic reasons for that, but I am trying to limit my verbosity in social media; in an increasingly patience reducing/aversion to spending that much time with it, it's wasting time.

In in short, there are regions of the planet that favor "synergistic" results. Those by convention ( being more than the sum of the contributing forces ...) will exceed the mean standard deviation models - by these exotic ranges, more readily so than regions that do not have feed-backs.  Those location will be able to get those +8 and +10 oddities over that base-line numerical/statistical layout.  The Pac NW is one of those regions.  I think the Pac NW and also San Francisco and L.A. can do this again sooner than we think. The shit with fires and heat last summer ?  that was no fluke and is related - whether the scalar values of the extremes match or not. 

 

I mean I think the short version of what you are saying is that both the mean and standard deviation are expected to increase more in the PAC NW than other areas. I think even if you factor that in, a 1 in 200,000 year event isn't becoming 1 in 10 anytime soon. 

Portland was 4.37 sigma... just skimming previous Portland annual max temperatures the mean seems to be around 100 and the SD would be around 3.7F. That region is expected to warm something like 6F by 2080 (vs 20th century) so the new mean is 106F and then say the SD grows from 3.7F to 4.5F... then a temperature of 116F would be a 2.22 sigma event ((116-106)/4.5).

That would still make it a 1 in 80 year event.

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9 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

Making a separate post regarding your edit.  Right, because we want to find the likelihood of an all-time record high temperature.  So the variance should be much less than it would be for a daily high.

Yeah just skimming Portland annual max temperatures the mean seems to be around 99-100 until recently it's more like 101-102. And the standard deviation a bit under 4. All guessing of course.

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47 minutes ago, skierinvermont said:

Yeah just skimming Portland annual max temperatures the mean seems to be around 99-100 until recently it's more like 101-102. And the standard deviation a bit under 4. All guessing of course.

Now if we use NYC data, it's probably less likely because the climate on the east coast is becoming more humid as well as warmer.  So warmer mins, but the maxes are leveling off.  You see how long it's been since NYC, LGA or JFK has had an all-time max. 1936 for the former, 1966 for the latter two.  I've been complaining about the lack of 100 degree heat here.  Last really big summer heat period was the 2010-2013 series when we had 4 summers hit 100.  Never did I think that Seattle could have an all-time high in excess of NYC's.  That's like Seattle having an all-time record snow season in excess of NYC's record from 1995-96!

We also have to consider the cycle of 11 years- the CONUS seems to get excessively hot summers (even for the current climate) in 11 year intervals.  Do you think that could be at play here too?  Looking at 1933,44,55,66,77,88,99,2010 and now 2021 they seem to be hot all across the country.  2010 was our summer of record heat.  These 11 year cyclic summers seem to be getting hotter too as time goes on.

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If you are making a list of singularities then the 2003 heat wave in Europe should be added, early August, longer duration than recent ones, large death toll from heat prostration in Paris. 

In historical terms, heat waves in 1911, 1944, 1948, 1953, 1966 are probably in the same league as more recent and better known cases (better known to younger weather weenies at any rate). 

Not all climate facts point to runaway warming. Toronto has broken 100F on twelve occasions, only one of them since 1953. The annual max for NYC peaked around the 1930s to 1950s and has only recently begun to approach the highest level it attained (running 30-year averages). 

I think AGW is real and plays a role, but we don't really understand what natural processes are at work in either an unmodified or modified climate, so a lot of this is speculation and guesswork, which tends to invite in a political spin factor since nature abhors a vacuum. But I think we have to be honest and say that we cannot be sure what interaction there might be between human modification and natural variability. And that can be taken any way you want, saying that does not make one a "denier" just a clarifier. The role of AGW could be less or it could be even greater. My main motivation in producing a raftload of climate studies is to try to find foundations for disentangling these signals. I would readily admit it is difficult work. 

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On 7/1/2021 at 6:00 PM, raindancewx said:

I work with par sheets, math and statistics in a casino a lot for my job, including forecasting. So even if the odds for this event are 1 in 1,000 or 1 in 1,000,000 in a natural climate, the truth is I've seen award pays listed at 1 in 350,000 or lower odds happen on back to back pulls. The reason it happens in the casino is probably similar to why it happens in the climate. The odds may be super low for an event to happen, but even a place like SW Canada or the Northwest US is only a small portion of the Earth and so those odds are for each square mile of the Earth for each day of the year. The odds are not 1 in 1,000 for the entire Earth to be +50 on a given day. The odds are for one particular spot on the Earth. So the same thing happens with the games, with 1,000+ machines and several featuring multiple denominations, or multiple play options or multiple games within the game (Poker, Blackjack etc) the real world effect is we've given two $500,000+ awards (from the vendor fortunately, not the tribe) in just the past year, even though the machines are setup to pay that much - correctly - at extremely low odds comparable to the odds you see the scientists throw around.

I would say to add to this, that each climate region / zone is akin to a slot machine with specific odds for an extremely unlikely event. The odds of a jackpot in the Northwest are apparently much higher in Summer for record heat than where I live in the mountains of the Southwest as an example. How do I know that? In Albuquerque, the all-time record high is 107. The highs reach 72 in mid-April peak at 92 in late June to early August, then fall back to 72 in mid-October. That means you have a six month period, for 1892 to 2020, which is 128 complete years at 183 days per year, when 35 degrees above average is less than 1/23,000+ odds, just going by the observations. That's even including substantial warming in that time frame. That's what I mean when I say the bigger effects are from climates changing climate zone/type. Seattle and Portland are perfectly capable of warming up rapidly by drawing up hot desert air in the Summer that sinks from the East rather than cool Maritime air from the West or cold Arctic air from the North. New Mexico is hot regardless, because whether from the south or east or north or west, the surrounding is hot. NM won't see +35 because in that six month time frame since there is no source region of air hot enough to put 127 degrees at 5,300 feet above sea level in July, or 107 in April or October.

The issue with this type of math is that the odds reset each day. It's not 1/23,000+ for Albuquerque to hit +35 for the half year, or 1/10,000 for Portland to do it in the Summer. It's each day. I know some spots hit +50, but the general area was more like +35.

Given that we just had multiple days of record readings, all concentrated in the same area, it's pretty obvious that because of the exposure to cold in the Arctic/ very wet Pacific air/ very hot desert air from the Southwest, that the odds of a +35 day in the Northwest in the Summer are actually way better than the <1/23,000 per day floor here.

If you split the Earth into 200 pieces, I would bet the average frequency for extremes resemble what I have observed in my lifetime. I am going to be 34 in September. In my lifetime, living in Philadelphia, London, and Albuquerque, I have experienced something like 5-10 days that were more than 30 degrees above or below the long-term average high for the place. Philadelphia had a high of 6 in 1994, that's out by +30. Off the top of my head, I remember some mid 80s pool parties in March 1990 and 1998, a 95 in April 2002, 23 in March 1996 after the very cold winter. That's my guess for most extreme in Philadelphia. It snowed when I was in London in October 2008, but that's not 30 out, despite being part of that record wave (their earliest snow since 1934). In Albuquerque, there was a high of 9 (-42) and then 18 in February 2011, a high of 20 (-33) in February 2021. That's it -seven (ish) days, with a few others right probably pretty close. So based on my random sampling of Earth's climate, I've experienced 7/ ~12,400 days more than 30 degrees above or below the average high, roughly 1/1,800. I'd imagine that's closer to the figure for the extreme heat, with the recognition, that those odds are for each day. That's also why you see the extremes so often. Using my lifetime, it would be: 1 in 1,800 odds for a +/-30 high, every day, run every day for each climate, since each day has a different weather pattern globally.

The other simpler issue is if you scan old newspaper and magazine accounts, you do have a lot of accounts of pretty extreme temps even in the 1800s in the Northwest. Some of the records online are free, like the one, others are behind paywalls from things like the NYT.

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/sites/default/files/march-1887-monthly-weather-review-final.pdfvia:

United States of America War Department, Monthly Weather Review for 1882, Washington D.C lists the data below

The following are the highest temperatures observed during July 1882 in the United States:

Fort Lapwai, Idaho (113° F, 45.0° C)

Umatilla, Oregon (105° F, 40.6° C) Alamota, Washington (105° F, 40.6° C)

One report says:

In August 1889, forest fires raged in California, Idaho, Washington, Michigan, Montana, Oregon and
Wyoming in the United States. At Seattle, Washington, for several weeks, this region was clouded by
smoke, caused by extensive forest fires in every direction. The entire eastern slope of the Cascade
Mountains, from Natchez Pass north to the boundary was in flames. At Helena, Montana, destructive
forest fires prevailed during the entire month of August. The fire consumed many million feet of lumber
and thousands of acres of timber.

Another report says Walla Walla hit 108 degrees in July 1891 as an example (pretty close still to the 114 record that stood from 1961 to a few days ago), with Portland at 102. I'm assuming with the current average July high of 89 or so in Walla, it was probably 85 or 86 back in the day, so just as now, you had +30 Summer days against the background of the climate state. I personally think the idea that the probability curve is what is changing for these events is sort of wrong. The events at the far end of the normal distribution are still very rare, they're just somewhat warmer when they do happen. If you change a spot from averaging 70 degrees to 72 degrees annually, and the physical limit of the spot is +/-35 v. the average, people can adapt to it. The issue would be if you changed from 70 to 72 and also shifted to a different climate zone, and suddenly +40 and -40 events became as routine as the +30 or -30 events against the 72 baseline. That's why that "record heat SW" thread has no real activity. It's great that you're concerned that we had a 600 decameter high. We'll have another one this week, and just like the last one, people here won't even notice.

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Weather summary
for Saskatchewan
issued by Environment Canada
at 4:03 p.m. CST Friday 2 July 2021.

Discussion.

Daily temperatures records were broken across Saskatchewan 
yesterday. Several all-time records have also been confirmed. 

The following areas set an all-time temperature record on July 1, 
2021. Temperatures in degrees Celsius. 

Collins Bay Area 
New record of 37.0 
Old record of 35.5 set on June 30, 2021 
Records in this area have been kept since 1972 

The following areas set an all-time temperature record on June 30, 
2021. Temperatures in degrees Celsius. 

Buffalo Narrows Area 
New record of 35.8 
Old record of 35.6 set on June 27, 2002 
Records in this area have been kept since 1962 

Collins Bay Area 
New record of 35.5 
Old record of 33.0 set on June 27, 2002 
Records in this area have been kept since 1972 

Key Lake Area 
New record of 37.0 
Old record of 36.0 set on August 10, 1991 
Records in this area have been kept since 1976 

Stony Rapids Area 
New record of 39.8 
Old record of 36.7 set on June 27, 2002 
Records in this area have been kept since 1960 

Uranium City Area 
New record of 38.0 
Old record of 34.7 set on July 27, 1984 
Records in this area have been kept since 1953 

The following areas set a daily maximum temperature record on July 
1, 2021. Temperatures in degrees Celsius. 

Assiniboia Area 
New record of 33.7 
Old record of 31.5 set in 1985 
Records in this area have been kept since 1965 

Buffalo Narrows Area 
New record of 34.0 
Old record of 31.0 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1962 

Collins Bay Area 
New record of 37.2 
Old record of 31.5 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1972 

Coronach Area 
New record of 34.8 
Old record of 33.0 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1961 

Cypress Hills (Provincial Park) Area 
New record of 32.6 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1918 

Elbow Area 
New record of 34.2 
Old record of 32.4 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1955 

Humboldt Area 
New record of 34.0 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1944 
Records in this area have been kept since 1904 

Key Lake Area 
New record of 36.7 
Old record of 30.6 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1976 

Kindersley Area 
New record of 37.8 
Old record of 36.7 set in 1944 
Records in this area have been kept since 1942 

La Ronge Area 
New record of 33.8 
Old record of 30.6 set in 1976 
Records in this area have been kept since 1923 

Last Mountain Lake (Sanctuary) Area 
New record of 33.9 
Old record of 32.0 set in 1990 
Records in this area have been kept since 1975 

Leader Area 
New record of 38.5 
Old record of 37.2 set in 1936 
Records in this area have been kept since 1924 

Lucky Lake Area 
New record of 35.0 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1976 
Records in this area have been kept since 1972 

Maple Creek Area 
New record of 37.6 
Old record of 34.4 set in 1937 
Records in this area have been kept since 1915 

Meadow Lake Area 
New record of 34.2 
Old record of 28.6 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1959 

North Battleford Area 
New record of 35.5 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1914 
Records in this area have been kept since 1879 

Prince Albert Area 
New record of 33.2 
Old record of 32.2 set in 1885 
Records in this area have been kept since 1884 

Rockglen Area 
New record of 33.7 
Old record of 30.7 set in 2003 
Records in this area have been kept since 1970 

Rosetown Area 
New record of 36.4 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1937 
Records in this area have been kept since 1913 

Saskatoon Area 
New record of 35.4 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1962 
Records in this area have been kept since 1900 

Scott Area 
New record of 35.5 
Old record of 32.8 set in 1948 
Records in this area have been kept since 1911 

Southend Reindeer Area 
New record of 35.6 
Old record of 31.5 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1938 

Stony Rapids Area 
New record of 38.5 
Old record of 31.8 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1960 

Swift Current Area 
New record of 35.2 
Old record of 33.9 set in 1937 
Records in this area have been kept since 1885 

Waskesiu Lake Area 
New record of 32.6 
Old record of 28.9 set in 2013 
Records in this area have been kept since 1966 

Watrous Area 
New record of 33.4 
Old record of 30.0 set in 1988 
Records in this area have been kept since 1953 

Wynyard Area 
New record of 32.5 
Old record of 29.8 set in 1988 
Records in this area have been kept since 1964 

Note: the temperature records reported here have been derived from a 
selection of historical stations in each geographic area that were 
active during the period of record.

Please note that this summary may contain preliminary or unofficial 
information and does not constitute a complete or final report.

End/PASPC
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9 hours ago, raindancewx said:

I would say to add to this, that each climate region / zone is akin to a slot machine with specific odds for an extremely unlikely event. The odds of a jackpot in the Northwest are apparently much higher in Summer for record heat than where I live in the mountains of the Southwest as an example. How do I know that? In Albuquerque, the all-time record high is 107. The highs reach 72 in mid-April peak at 92 in late June to early August, then fall back to 72 in mid-October. That means you have a six month period, for 1892 to 2020, which is 128 complete years at 183 days per year, when 35 degrees above average is less than 1/23,000+ odds, just going by the observations. That's even including substantial warming in that time frame. That's what I mean when I say the bigger effects are from climates changing climate zone/type. Seattle and Portland are perfectly capable of warming up rapidly by drawing up hot desert air in the Summer that sinks from the East rather than cool Maritime air from the West or cold Arctic air from the North. New Mexico is hot regardless, because whether from the south or east or north or west, the surrounding is hot. NM won't see +35 because in that six month time frame since there is no source region of air hot enough to put 127 degrees at 5,300 feet above sea level in July, or 107 in April or October.

The issue with this type of math is that the odds reset each day. It's not 1/23,000+ for Albuquerque to hit +35 for the half year, or 1/10,000 for Portland to do it in the Summer. It's each day. I know some spots hit +50, but the general area was more like +35.

Given that we just had multiple days of record readings, all concentrated in the same area, it's pretty obvious that because of the exposure to cold in the Arctic/ very wet Pacific air/ very hot desert air from the Southwest, that the odds of a +35 day in the Northwest in the Summer are actually way better than the <1/23,000 per day floor here.

If you split the Earth into 200 pieces, I would bet the average frequency for extremes resemble what I have observed in my lifetime. I am going to be 34 in September. In my lifetime, living in Philadelphia, London, and Albuquerque, I have experienced something like 5-10 days that were more than 30 degrees above or below the long-term average high for the place. Philadelphia had a high of 6 in 1994, that's out by +30. Off the top of my head, I remember some mid 80s pool parties in March 1990 and 1998, a 95 in April 2002, 23 in March 1996 after the very cold winter. That's my guess for most extreme in Philadelphia. It snowed when I was in London in October 2008, but that's not 30 out, despite being part of that record wave (their earliest snow since 1934). In Albuquerque, there was a high of 9 (-42) and then 18 in February 2011, a high of 20 (-33) in February 2021. That's it -seven (ish) days, with a few others right probably pretty close. So based on my random sampling of Earth's climate, I've experienced 7/ ~12,400 days more than 30 degrees above or below the average high, roughly 1/1,800. I'd imagine that's closer to the figure for the extreme heat, with the recognition, that those odds are for each day. That's also why you see the extremes so often. Using my lifetime, it would be: 1 in 1,800 odds for a +/-30 high, every day, run every day for each climate, since each day has a different weather pattern globally.

The other simpler issue is if you scan old newspaper and magazine accounts, you do have a lot of accounts of pretty extreme temps even in the 1800s in the Northwest. Some of the records online are free, like the one, others are behind paywalls from things like the NYT.

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/sites/default/files/march-1887-monthly-weather-review-final.pdfvia:

United States of America War Department, Monthly Weather Review for 1882, Washington D.C lists the data below

The following are the highest temperatures observed during July 1882 in the United States:

Fort Lapwai, Idaho (113° F, 45.0° C)

Umatilla, Oregon (105° F, 40.6° C) Alamota, Washington (105° F, 40.6° C)

One report says:

In August 1889, forest fires raged in California, Idaho, Washington, Michigan, Montana, Oregon and
Wyoming in the United States. At Seattle, Washington, for several weeks, this region was clouded by
smoke, caused by extensive forest fires in every direction. The entire eastern slope of the Cascade
Mountains, from Natchez Pass north to the boundary was in flames. At Helena, Montana, destructive
forest fires prevailed during the entire month of August. The fire consumed many million feet of lumber
and thousands of acres of timber.

Another report says Walla Walla hit 108 degrees in July 1891 as an example (pretty close still to the 114 record that stood from 1961 to a few days ago), with Portland at 102. I'm assuming with the current average July high of 89 or so in Walla, it was probably 85 or 86 back in the day, so just as now, you had +30 Summer days against the background of the climate state. I personally think the idea that the probability curve is what is changing for these events is sort of wrong. The events at the far end of the normal distribution are still very rare, they're just somewhat warmer when they do happen. If you change a spot from averaging 70 degrees to 72 degrees annually, and the physical limit of the spot is +/-35 v. the average, people can adapt to it. The issue would be if you changed from 70 to 72 and also shifted to a different climate zone, and suddenly +40 and -40 events became as routine as the +30 or -30 events against the 72 baseline. That's why that "record heat SW" thread has no real activity. It's great that you're concerned that we had a 600 decameter high. We'll have another one this week, and just like the last one, people here won't even notice.

I remember that spring break heat in March 1990 very clearly- and then we had snow in April that same here lol.  I also remember the amazing heatwave in April 2002, one of my favorite summers followed and then a big snowfall winter.

 

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13 hours ago, Roger Smith said:

If you are making a list of singularities then the 2003 heat wave in Europe should be added, early August, longer duration than recent ones, large death toll from heat prostration in Paris. 

In historical terms, heat waves in 1911, 1944, 1948, 1953, 1966 are probably in the same league as more recent and better known cases (better known to younger weather weenies at any rate). 

Not all climate facts point to runaway warming. Toronto has broken 100F on twelve occasions, only one of them since 1953. The annual max for NYC peaked around the 1930s to 1950s and has only recently begun to approach the highest level it attained (running 30-year averages). 

I think AGW is real and plays a role, but we don't really understand what natural processes are at work in either an unmodified or modified climate, so a lot of this is speculation and guesswork, which tends to invite in a political spin factor since nature abhors a vacuum. But I think we have to be honest and say that we cannot be sure what interaction there might be between human modification and natural variability. And that can be taken any way you want, saying that does not make one a "denier" just a clarifier. The role of AGW could be less or it could be even greater. My main motivation in producing a raftload of climate studies is to try to find foundations for disentangling these signals. I would readily admit it is difficult work. 

Dont forget 1966, when the high temp records were set at LGA and JFK- also part of the 11 yr cycle

 

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I know that the obvious focus of this extreme event was the all-time nature of the heat for any month by such a wide margin. But the other story is how many stations across the country set or tied their June monthly high temperature from the Pacific NW across to New England. It’s very unusual to set or tie all-time record highs  for a month from the NW to the NE in the same month. This may have been the first time that Portland Maine and Portland Oregon had a warmest month at the same time.

Time Series Summary for Portland Area, ME (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Mean Avg Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 68.9 0
2 2001 67.1 0
3 1884 67.0 0
Time Series Summary for Portland Area, OR (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Mean Avg Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 70.7 0
2 2015 70.3 0
3 1992 67.4

0


New June maximum temperature records 

Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Max Temperature 
Missing Count
       
-      
       
-      
-      
Time Series Summary for Boston Area, MA (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Max Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 100 0
- 1952 100 0
- 1925 100 0

 

Time Series Summary for NEWARK LIBERTY INTL AP, NJ - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Max Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 103 0
2 2011 102 0
- 1994 102 0
- 1993 102 0
- 1952 102 0
- 1943 102 0

 

Time Series Summary for Missoula Area, MT (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Max Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 102 0
- 2015 102 0
3 1937 100 0

 

Time Series Summary for Salt Lake City Area, UT (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Max Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 107 0
2 2013 105 0
3 2015 104 0
- 1979 104 0
- 1961 104 0
Time Series Summary for Grand Junction Area, CO (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Max Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 105 0
- 1990 105 0
2 2016 104 0
- 1994 104 0
- 1900 104 0


 

All-time June monthly warmest minimum temperatures 

Time Series Summary for Caribou Area, ME (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Min Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 69 0
- 2017 69 0
- 1949 69 0
- 1942 69 0


 

Time Series Summary for Portland Area, ME (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Min Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 75 0
2 1931 74 0
- 1923 74 0
- 1901 74 0
Time Series Summary for Syracuse Area, NY (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Min Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 78 0
2 1999 77 0
3 1925 76 0

 

Time Series Summary for Concord Area, NH (ThreadEx) - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Min Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 74 0
- 1875 74 0

 

Time Series Summary for WESTCHESTER CO AP, NY - Month of Jun
Click column heading to sort ascending, click again to sort descending.
Rank
Year
Highest Min Temperature 
Missing Count
1 2021 77 0
- 1991 77 2
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16 hours ago, Typhoon Tip said:

This won't sound altogether cogently scientific, admittedly .. but, I get the weird 'feeling' this is ...sort of an introduction ceremony into a new climate realm where this occurrence takes place in certain regions with more ease than those staggering odds implicate in rareness. 

I have some analytic reasons for that, but I am trying to limit my verbosity in social media; in an increasingly patience reducing/aversion to spending that much time with it, it's wasting time.

In short, there are regions of the planet that favor "synergistic" results. Those by convention ( being more than the sum of the contributing forces ...) will exceed the mean standard deviation models - by these exotic ranges, more readily so than regions that do not have feed-backs.  Those location will be able to get those +8 and +10 oddities over that base-line numerical/statistical layout.  The Pac NW is one of those regions.  I think the Pac NW and also San Francisco and L.A. can do this again sooner than we think. The shit with fires and heat last summer ?  that was no fluke and is related - whether the scalar values of the extremes match or not.  And I would tend to assert that the aggregate speaks to the real state of the 'rareness' - I.e. not as much so as we may think.

 

Recent summer warming has favored the W US.

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/july-2020-climate-outlook-has-no-good-news-us-southwest

 

summertemptrends.png

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The Washington Post reported:

Within the next week, researchers expect to publish a “rapid attribution” study that determines how climate change made the Northwest heat wave more likely. Yet precisely quantifying the role of climate change in the event has been difficult because the heat was just so extreme, said Michael Wehner, a climate scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California who is contributing to the attribution effort.

“It’s well beyond what straightforward statistical analysis would suggest. It’s well beyond what climate models suggest,” he continued. “But it happened.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/07/03/climate-change-heat-dome-death/

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19 hours ago, raindancewx said:

I would say to add to this, that each climate region / zone is akin to a slot machine with specific odds for an extremely unlikely event. The odds of a jackpot in the Northwest are apparently much higher in Summer for record heat than where I live in the mountains of the Southwest as an example. How do I know that? In Albuquerque, the all-time record high is 107. The highs reach 72 in mid-April peak at 92 in late June to early August, then fall back to 72 in mid-October. That means you have a six month period, for 1892 to 2020, which is 128 complete years at 183 days per year, when 35 degrees above average is less than 1/23,000+ odds, just going by the observations. That's even including substantial warming in that time frame. That's what I mean when I say the bigger effects are from climates changing climate zone/type. Seattle and Portland are perfectly capable of warming up rapidly by drawing up hot desert air in the Summer that sinks from the East rather than cool Maritime air from the West or cold Arctic air from the North. New Mexico is hot regardless, because whether from the south or east or north or west, the surrounding is hot. NM won't see +35 because in that six month time frame since there is no source region of air hot enough to put 127 degrees at 5,300 feet above sea level in July, or 107 in April or October.

The issue with this type of math is that the odds reset each day. It's not 1/23,000+ for Albuquerque to hit +35 for the half year, or 1/10,000 for Portland to do it in the Summer. It's each day. I know some spots hit +50, but the general area was more like +35.

Given that we just had multiple days of record readings, all concentrated in the same area, it's pretty obvious that because of the exposure to cold in the Arctic/ very wet Pacific air/ very hot desert air from the Southwest, that the odds of a +35 day in the Northwest in the Summer are actually way better than the <1/23,000 per day floor here.

If you split the Earth into 200 pieces, I would bet the average frequency for extremes resemble what I have observed in my lifetime. I am going to be 34 in September. In my lifetime, living in Philadelphia, London, and Albuquerque, I have experienced something like 5-10 days that were more than 30 degrees above or below the long-term average high for the place. Philadelphia had a high of 6 in 1994, that's out by +30. Off the top of my head, I remember some mid 80s pool parties in March 1990 and 1998, a 95 in April 2002, 23 in March 1996 after the very cold winter. That's my guess for most extreme in Philadelphia. It snowed when I was in London in October 2008, but that's not 30 out, despite being part of that record wave (their earliest snow since 1934). In Albuquerque, there was a high of 9 (-42) and then 18 in February 2011, a high of 20 (-33) in February 2021. That's it -seven (ish) days, with a few others right probably pretty close. So based on my random sampling of Earth's climate, I've experienced 7/ ~12,400 days more than 30 degrees above or below the average high, roughly 1/1,800. I'd imagine that's closer to the figure for the extreme heat, with the recognition, that those odds are for each day. That's also why you see the extremes so often. Using my lifetime, it would be: 1 in 1,800 odds for a +/-30 high, every day, run every day for each climate, since each day has a different weather pattern globally.

The other simpler issue is if you scan old newspaper and magazine accounts, you do have a lot of accounts of pretty extreme temps even in the 1800s in the Northwest. Some of the records online are free, like the one, others are behind paywalls from things like the NYT.

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/sites/default/files/march-1887-monthly-weather-review-final.pdfvia:

United States of America War Department, Monthly Weather Review for 1882, Washington D.C lists the data below

The following are the highest temperatures observed during July 1882 in the United States:

Fort Lapwai, Idaho (113° F, 45.0° C)

Umatilla, Oregon (105° F, 40.6° C) Alamota, Washington (105° F, 40.6° C)

One report says:

In August 1889, forest fires raged in California, Idaho, Washington, Michigan, Montana, Oregon and
Wyoming in the United States. At Seattle, Washington, for several weeks, this region was clouded by
smoke, caused by extensive forest fires in every direction. The entire eastern slope of the Cascade
Mountains, from Natchez Pass north to the boundary was in flames. At Helena, Montana, destructive
forest fires prevailed during the entire month of August. The fire consumed many million feet of lumber
and thousands of acres of timber.

Another report says Walla Walla hit 108 degrees in July 1891 as an example (pretty close still to the 114 record that stood from 1961 to a few days ago), with Portland at 102. I'm assuming with the current average July high of 89 or so in Walla, it was probably 85 or 86 back in the day, so just as now, you had +30 Summer days against the background of the climate state. I personally think the idea that the probability curve is what is changing for these events is sort of wrong. The events at the far end of the normal distribution are still very rare, they're just somewhat warmer when they do happen. If you change a spot from averaging 70 degrees to 72 degrees annually, and the physical limit of the spot is +/-35 v. the average, people can adapt to it. The issue would be if you changed from 70 to 72 and also shifted to a different climate zone, and suddenly +40 and -40 events became as routine as the +30 or -30 events against the 72 baseline. That's why that "record heat SW" thread has no real activity. It's great that you're concerned that we had a 600 decameter high. We'll have another one this week, and just like the last one, people here won't even notice.

One correction, it's not 1/10,000 to hit 116 on any given summer day, it's 1 in 200,000 to hit it for the entire summer. That's on a 1951-1980 baseline. Or 1 in 15,000 summers on a current baseline. But the statistic being floated around isn't just for a particular day.

That's assuming a normal distribution of maximum annual temperatures. I think you were saying that maybe the odds of this are a little higher than we might think because extreme events might be more common in a place like Seattle than in Tucson, because in Seattle, the "perfect" pattern could blow Tucson air onto Seattle and somehow in 100 years of data the "perfect" pattern just never happend (and nothing close to it either). I think I agree with this  but I hadn't mentioned it yet. I think the more technical way of saying it is that we only have ~100 years of maximum annual temperature observations. That's only ~100 datapoints. To assume the distribution is normal, or that the distribution is well-sampled with a sample size of 100 is a significant assumption. Usually, a random sample is still enough to estimate the standard deviation accurately because even if in 100 years of data we never saw "the perfect pattern" we would have seen a near perfect pattern a few times. But maybe this is just an especially unique pattern and "near perfect" behaves very different from "perfect." Again, in other words maybe the distribution is not "normal."

Another thing is this datapoint alone will dramatically shift the distribution. If you use a 1951-1980 baseline, the sample size is only 30 datapoints, which is probably a lot more accurate than most people think mathematically, but it is on the small size to form a representative sample. 

The other way of doing it that would get us more data is to use daily temperatures. From that distribution using random sampling you could generate a distribution of annual maximum temperatures. Or you could calculate the probability of seeing 116 on any given day. I'm pretty confident though that you'd still find it to be roughly a 4 sigma event (1 in 30,000 summers) if not the 4.37 sigma Don provided (1 in 200,000 summers). For a daily temperature anomaly it's likely 5 or 6 sigma (1 in 50 million). You still are assuming normality which is usually a pretty safe assumption, but maybe this is the rare exception. 

This is all speculation though. In general, assumptions of normality and small sample sizes work a lot better than most people think. It's not perfect, but usually it's very very close. But maybe this kind of error is the difference between 1 in 200,000 and 1 in 100,000.

Either way, I think it's important to recognize that this was not a 1 in 10,000 event for any given day in Portland. This was a 1 in 200,000 year event for any given summer in Portland. Major major difference. On a 21st century baseline it was more like a 1 in 15,000 summers event. In other words, the shifting of the distribution (due to climate change) made it ~10-15x more likely.

 

One last way of putting this, I believe it was calculated that this event was a 1 in 1,000 year event for the entire planet. In other words, the probability of seeing anomalies like this anywhere on earth in a given year is 1 in 1,000. In 100+ years of data that would mean there's some small but not tiny chance of this happening.

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