Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Active And Unusual Weather

Wow what an evening in the Denver metro area. A cold front slipped into the region Monday evening and fired up a nasty line of storms that raked the entire metro between 10 pm and midnight.

On the west side of the city along the foothills, a supercell formed and spawned an apparent tornado (or even a few) as it moved southeast along the foothills from Wheat Ridge and Arvada to Castle Rock.

Very rare both for the intensity, the time of day and for the location.

I drove home from my part-time job just after 11pm and found my neighborhood on the southeast side of the metro hammered with heavy rain. Water was flowing down the streets like a torrent.

The lightning was incredible.

I cannot wait for daylight and all the storm assessments to get published!

On a different note...

I ran across a great article from the National Weather Service office in Las Vegas tonight.

It apparently hit 128 degrees this past Saturday in Death Valley, CA.

In the public information statement they give some awesome statistics on how often this happens and the most statistical days for it to occur.

The statement follows...

THE HIGH TEMPERATURE TODAY...SATURDAY JULY 18 2009...REACHED 128
DEGREES AT THE OFFICIAL WEATHER STATION AT FURNACE CREEK IN DEATH
VALLEY CALIFORNIA LOCATED AT 194 FEET BELOW SEA LEVEL.

JUST HOW UNUSUAL IS 128 FOR A HIGH TEMPERATURE IN DEATH VALLEY? THE
NORMAL HIGH TEMPERATURE FOR JULY 18TH IS 115 DEGREES. LOOKING BACK
AT WEATHER RECORDS FOR DEATH VALLEY WHICH DATE BACK TO JUNE 8 1911
THE HIGH TEMPERATURE HAS ONLY REACHED 128 DEGREES OR BETTER IN DEATH
VALLEY ON 20 INSTANCES. THE MOST RECENT TIME IT WAS AS HOT OR HOTTER
THAN TODAY WAS ON JULY 6 2007 WHEN IT REACHED 129 DEGREES.

STATISTICALLY JULY 18TH HAS SEEN THE THERMOMETER REACH 128 DEGREES
OR BETTER MORE THAN ANY OTHER CALENDAR DATE IN DEATH VALLEY. A HIGH
OF 128 DEGREES WAS RECORDED ON JULY 18 1998...JULY 18 2005 AS WELL
AS JULY 18 2009. IT HAS REACHED 129 DEGREES ON JULY 18 1922 AND JULY
18 1960.

AS FAR AS SOME OTHER STATISTICS ON HIGH TEMPERATURES IN DEATH VALLEY
A HIGH TEMPERATURE OF 129 DEGREES OR BETTER HAS ONLY OCCURRED 10
TIMES SINCE RECORDS STARTED. AS FOR THE 3 HIGHEST READINGS WHICH ARE
130 DEGREES OR ABOVE...ALL OCCURRED IN JULY 1913. THE ALL-TIME
RECORD HIGH IN DEATH VALLEY IS 134 DEGREES SET ON JULY 10 1913.

WE EXTEND OUR APPRECIATION TO THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE FOR TAKING
WEATHER OBSERVATIONS IN DEATH VALLEY AND SOME OF THE ABOVE
INFORMATION.

2 comments:

  1. Can you imagine what the ground temp is on a day when the temp registers 134 degrees? Back in 2007 we ( children and I - we are homeschoolers ) did a study of the ground temp. because the ground was so hot it burned our feet. Keep in mind that Mid TN was in a drought and our grass was all but gone. I recorded air temps of 107 degrees and a ground temp of 136 degrees. In areas where the grass was kept alive by the septic system the temps were in the mid 80's.

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  2. SuzieE, what a grand study! I bet the kids loved it.

    About Death Valley, did you see TWC trying to fry an egg on the asphalt? Funny stuff.

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