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Lowest Maximum: 37°F
Highest Minimum: 53°F
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Precipitation: 0.73"
Days with rain >1mm: 7
Days with rain/drizzle: 16
Most in one day: 0.26"
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Average Maximum Wind Gust: 20 mph
Maximum Wind Gust: 32 mph
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Days with:
Hail/Ice Pellets: 0
Snow falling: 1
Snow lying: 0
Air Frost: 8
Ice Days: 0
Max Snow Depth: 0"
Extremely warm and dry month here in northwest NJ. Actually, I believe it's the second warmest March on record next to 1945. There was no snow that actually stuck the entire month, and no snow on the ground either. There were only a few days with frost when usually almost every day in March sees frost. The only significant rainfall came on the 2nd and the 31st, and even then it was only about a quarter of an inch on each day. This is definitely one March I won't forget anytime soon!
Keep in mind that station was offline March 9th-14th.
Average max: 31.4C / 89F (+1.9C)
Average min: 16.1C / 61F (-0.4C)
Highest Temperature: 41.1C /106F on the 11th
Lowest Temperature: 9.0C / 48F on the 31st
Lowest Maximum: 22.8C / 73F on the 30th
Highest Minimum: 20.7C / 69F on the 13th
Rainfall: 0.4mm / 0.02" (2% of normal rainfall)
Raindays: 2
Highest daily rainfall: 0.2mm/0.01" on the 30th and 31st
Mean daily sunshine: 10.6 hours
Sunshine total: 329.1 hours
Maximum wind gust: ENE @ 48 km/h (29.8 mph)
Another dry March with above average temperatures, though a cool end to the month ensured that it was not as hot as March 2011. Looking forward to a relatively cool and wet start to April.
This March, while not departing from normal so much as many places (International Falls with their +14.6, Minneapolis with their +15.5), perhaps due to the influence of Lake Superior, was the warmest on record at the International Airport, exceeding by half a degree a former record that has stood for 134 years. Five daily maximum temperature records and a consecutive string of six daily minimum records starting on the 17th were broken. Duluth had its warmest March night ever on the 18th and 20th, with lows of 50 degrees, breaking the previous record of 48 set on March 28th (1948?).
Note that these records were set at the DULUTH INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, and only reflect weather inland. The Duluth Sky Harbor station suffered quite a different fate, with temperatures 30+ F or more below the Sky Harbor Airport station on Park Point (between the bay and the lake) 10 miles away.
The real warmth started did not start until the 10th. Prior to that, Duluth was about as wintery as it had been since the first half of December. A combined 11.4" of snow fell from the 2nd to the 4th, raising the snow pack from about a foot to 19". Note that until snow events at the end of February, Duluth had, for most of the winter, a snow pack of 4 inches or less. Highs were in the 20's and 30's, while the low dipped down to 6 on the 4th and -1 on the 5th.
Then the 10th came, and Duluth saw its first 50-degree reading of the year, 53 on March 10th. From there on until the 25th, the average temperature would depart by at least 15 degrees from the normal. This was followed up by the first 60 (which usually occurs in April) on March 14th with 68F, and the first 70 on March 17th with 75F. The 17th, 18th, and 19th, whose highs were all in the 70's, departed from normal by 32, 35, and 33 degrees consecutively. I don't know when the last time, if ever, such sustained, abnormal warmth has occurred. It cooled down into the 50's beginning on the 21st but rebounded to 70 on the 24th, cooled down again to 35/27 on the 26th, but shot back up to 67 on the 27th. It remained cool, albeit 3 - 9 degrees above average for the rest of the month, with cloudy or overcast days, highs in the 40's, and lows in the 30's.
By the lake - which includes the most populous neighborhoods of Duluth and its sister city of Superior - things were much different. The warmest temperature at Sky Harbor Airport on Park Point, on a sandbar between Lake Superior and the Duluth Harbor, was 67 on the 27th. While the International Airport was in the 60's and 70's, an on-shore breeze forced temperatures into the 40s and 50s. On the 18th, a high of 44 and low of 35 were observed there, compared to a high of 75 and low of 50 at the airport. However, warmer weather in the first part of the month, when the lake breeze warmed things up somewhat, means the difference between the mean monthly temperatures at the Airport and Sky Harbor were not significant.
Average high: 13.6C (+3.2)
Average low: 4.9C (+1.3)
Average: 9.2C (+2.2)
Highest temperature: 20.8C
Lowest temperature: 1.5C
Air Frosts: 0
Days above 10C: 24
Rainfall: 21.3mm (-58%) on 3 days (-7)
Wintry precipitation: nil
Sunshine: 182 hours (+71%)
Another above average (though not as ridiculously so as some places), dry, sunny month. Consistently slightly above average for the first two thirds of the month then almost constant sunshine with warm days and cool nights for over a week towards the end. To put that sunshine figure into context 2000, 2002 and 2004 did not have a single month with more sunshine than what we've just had this March. The grass is still green but the earth is starting to crack in places like what you might expect in a typical midsummer - unsurprising considering our total YTD rainfall has been just 85.3mm, barely half the average, and this coming after a dry 2011.
National figures:
Central England Temperature: 8.3C (+1.7C)
England and Wales Rainfall: 30.3mm (-58%)
England and Wales Sunshine: 185 hours (+59%)
Six out of the past seven months have now been at least 1C above average - the first time this has ever happened. Apart from two weeks at the start of February it's just been mild almost every week since the start of September last year. This has only been the warmest March since 1997, but still the joint-fourth warmest on record.
From Hyslop Field, Corvallis, OR "official" weather station:
Comparing this March with last year's horrid month we had far more sunshine than March 2011. There may have been 20 hours for the entire month then and we got that much this year by the fifth. We went on to have several more sunny and partly sunny days with a sunshine total estimated (we seem not to measure it here) at maybe as much as 90 hours.
Don't laugh, we didn't get that much for the entirety of March and April last year.
We also just missed setting an all-time march record for rainfall amount at 11.47 inches (291+mm); just .23 (6) shy of 1917's deluge. We had 5 days with more than an inch of rain and one other that just missed it. On the other hand, we had seven days with no measurable rain and in 2011 only got one.
Temperature wise we avoided a record cold March only because clouds and rain still predominated and kept night time temperatures to within 2.2 degrees (1.2C) of average. Daytime maxima fell through the floor. We still ended up 3.5 degrees (~2) below climatology.
The signature feature for the month was the record setting snow falls we got. We exceeded our previous March record by more than a third and got more snow on the 22nd alone than the combined total of all Willamette Valley snow events between December 2008 (our last major snow dump) and this year. Less than a week previous, places on the Oregon coast that had not seen snow since 1989 got more than they had ever seen before in any month.
What's in store for April? This isn't set in stone but based on medium range climate outlooks, our sociopathic Aleutian Low with expansionist designs, a negative PDO cycle plus a La Nina that simply won't go away - and comparing what's happened so far this year to analog years, I'm guessing a much colder, much cloudier, much more unsettled month than last year. We will have as many or more days with precipitation as we did in March and will accumulate significantly more of it than average for April. We may see as much as in a typical January. Not all of it will be rain, by the way, though the kind of snow and slush accumulations we got last month are unlikely.
Additionally, while cold for the time of year, temperatures will be plenty warm enough, especially toward the end of the month, that what stuff as does fall on our now bloated snowpacks will be rain and all of that will have to go somewhere. I also anticipate a lot of urban and small stream flooding. Even the Willamette might go over its banks.
The coldest April on record for Corvallis was in 1955; we will come close to that nadir and maybe even beat it.
Lowest Maximum: -15.3°C / 4.5°F (12th)
Highest Minimum: 2.2°C / 36.0°F (28th)
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Precipitation: 51mm / 2.0 in
Days with rain or snow: 18
Most in one day: 8.0 mm / 0.3 in (24th)
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In the first half of March was a winter weather with low temperatures even in the daily hours. While the second part of this month was humid and overcast with the daily temperatures above zero degrees.
Not really impressed with this March, as there were no thunderstorms. Also, even though the airport had a 34mm downpour on one day, at my house I measured just 5mm. Temperatures were slightly below normal, like January and February, and there were some pretty cool nights, but no cool days.
Lowest Minimum: 13.9 C (57 F)
Average Minimum: 17.8 C (64 F)
Highest Minimum: 20.2 C (68.4 F)
Lowest Maximum: 20 C (68 F)
Average Maximum: 24.7 C (76.4 F)
Highest Maximum: 29.5 C (85.1 F)
Average Maximum Std Deviation: 2.4
Average Day-to-Day Maximum Deviation: 2.7 C (36.9 F)
Total Rainfall: 269.8 mm (10.62 inches)
Total Sunshine: 210.4 hours
Avg Sunshine / Day: 6.8 hrs/day
Total Days 0 Sunshine: 3 days
Total Days <= 3 Hrs Sunshine: 8 days
Total Days >= 8 Hrs Sunshine: 13 days
Total Days Missing Sunshine Data: 0 days
Notes:
The most notable characteristic of March in Sydney was the abundant rainfall with a total of almost 270mm falling over 16 days (average precipitation days for Sydney for March is around 14 days). Usually we get around 145mm.
The heaviest falls were on the 8th and 17th with respective falls of 109mm and 42mm.
For the second month running, sunshine at 210 total hours, was marginally above the historical average (202 hours is the average). Temperatures were below average - the average maximum of 24.7C was below the long term average of 25.3C.
Pictures worth a few words here. HOT..and DRY
March 2012 ranked #1 in many spots in NorthEast US and most in Top5 warmest and driest.
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