Time For Heat Waves To Begin: How Many Record Highs This Summer?

Amazing what a week of warmth can do. This is May 14 in my St.
Albans yard, just as weather was turning warm after a cold snap....

It's Memorial Day weekend, as we all know, so it's the unofficial start to summer, goes the cliche anyway.

It's also the unofficial start to the season of punishing heat waves, at least in the Northern Hemisphere.

Things are off to a roasting start with record highs possible on the West Coast, big time in Siberia, and maybe even some challenged records coming soon to Vermont and the rest of northern New England.

I mentioned the Siberian heat the other day, but it really  has gone off the charts in the past couple of days.  There's a town way up in northern Siberia that has a normal high temperature this time of year of 32 degrees. The record high for the date had been 54 degrees, but the temperature soared all the way up to 78 degrees.

That's basically as if temperatures here in Vermont were in the mid-70s in February.
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The heat isn't, and won't be as extreme elsewhere, but it will be felt.

Excessive heat watches are in effect for California and the Desert Southwest this upcoming week.

-----and this is May 21, same view after just a week of warm sunshine. 

I know, I know, it's always hot in the summer in the Desert Southwest.

But by mid to late week, temperatures will be right around record highs in places like Las Vegas, where it would get to between 105 and 110 degrees. Hotspots like Lake Havasu City and Bullhead, Arizona could get as high as 115 degrees, and Death Valley could flirt with 120 degrees.

Ouch!

In central California, in places like Sacramento, temperatures are likely to get into the low 100s. Even the normally chilly San Francisco Bay area will share in the heat.

So will Vermont, but of course it won't reach 100 degrees.

It's already been quite warm, a nice reversal from our snowy Mother's Day weekend. It got up to 87 degrees in Burlington yesterday, though very low humidity made it feel anything but oppressive. Normal high temperatures are around 70 this time of year.

A weak cold front passed through northern Vermont and will do the same in southern Vermont today, cooling temperatures slightly and temporarily today and Sunday. Highs should "only" be in the mid to upper 70s both days, still pretty toasty for this time of year.

A lot more heat, this time accompanied by our first real humid spell of the year, comes in Tuesday into Thursday. Tuesday and Wednesday will be the hottest, with everybody well up into the 80s with maybe a few places touching 90 degrees. That could endanger a few record highs.

There will probably be some afternoon showers and thunderstorms around Wednesday and Thursday amid the humid conditions.  It's too soon to tell whether any of them will be strong. But, as noted yesterday, the rainfall is unlikely to be extensive enough to solve the growing dryness around here.