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How did our summer look climatologically?
Meteorological summer is defined as the weather from June 1 through Aug. 31. The reference, or normal, climate period is the 30-year period of 1991-2020. The State Climatology Office recently completed its analysis of our 2026 summer conditions and created a comparison with previous summers.
The statewide average temperature during the summer of 2026 was 68.5 Fahrenheit, which is 1.3 degrees above normal. This was the seventh consecutive summer during which Wisconsin experienced a warmer-than-average temperature. All three summer months were above their normal monthly temperature. The largest departures of three to four degrees were scattered throughout northern Wisconsin. Continue reading
What is considered “heavy rain”?
The National Weather Service defines rainfall rate as the intensity of liquid precipitation falling over a specific, short duration, typically expressed in inches or millimeters of accumulation per hour.
The American Meteorological Society defines heavy rain as a rainfall rate of 0.30 inches of rain per hour. Rainfall rate measures how hard rain falls at any given moment, while accumulation measures the total depth of water accumulated. Continue reading
Two Questions about Clouds
Clouds are composed of tiny liquid water droplets, whose diameters are about the width of a human hair, and tiny shards of ice in a variety of shapes, or habits. Whether a cloud is mostly liquid water droplets or ice particles depends, as you might guess, on the ambient temperature of the air in the cloud.
Tiny cloud liquid water droplets can remain in the liquid state to temperatures as low as about 14 degrees Fahrenheit, and when they do they are known as supercooled liquid water droplets. These droplets feel the downward directed force of gravity just like a baseball or a watermelon would. Because the droplets are so small, and therefore have small masses, the gravitational force can easily be balanced by an upward directed friction force resulting from the interaction of the droplets with the air molecules around them and so the droplets remain suspended. Continue reading
Do all hurricanes have an eye?
Seen from space, a hurricane appears as a vast spiral of clouds stretching across hundreds of miles. Near the center of strong hurricanes is the eye, a roughly circular region of comparatively calm weather, light winds, and low pressure.
The eye is one of the storm’s most recognizable features, but it is not the most dangerous part. That distinction belongs to the eyewall, the ring of towering thunderstorms that surrounds the eye and contains the hurricane’s strongest winds and most intense weather. Continue reading
Is it dangerous to fly through a thunderstorm?
Thunderstorms pose several hazards, whether you are on the ground or in the air, namely lightning, hail, turbulence, icing, downbursts and even tornadoes. Because of these potential hazards, planes don’t fly through thunderstorms. Instead, they fly around them.
Pilots have onboard weather radar and air traffic control support to steer around thunderstorms rather than fly straight through them. In addition to pilots being trained to avoid thunderstorms, modern engineering has led to commercial aircraft designs that can withstand many of these threats. Continue reading
Category: Severe Weather, Weather Dangers
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