It’s 5K Time! Peltier Park race gives proceeds to Brain Aneurysm Foundation
August 26, 2015
OUTDOOR MEMORIES
August 29, 2015
July had the highest average global land and ocean temperatures on record since 1880, according to the July 2015 Global Climate Report released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Recorded temperatures in the Baton Rouge and New Orleans areas were the second hottest month on record since 1892 and 1871, respectively, said Christopher Bannan, a meteorologist with the NOAA’s Southeast Louisiana bureau in Slidell. This July, Baton Rouge averaged 85.3 degrees and New Orleans averaged 85.6 degrees.
The hottest July on record for the Baton Rouge area was in 1960 at 85.6 degrees. For New Orleans, the hottest July was in 1980 at 85.8 degrees. Climatologists consider July to be the hottest month of the year every year.
Baton Rouge and New Orleans are used to represent southeast Louisiana’s climate because datasets for other cities locally give an accurate representation of the region’s climate over time, Bannan said.
“Basically, there was a strong sub-tropical ridge was over the southern United States and it kept us warm and basically rain-free,” Bannan said. The subtropical ridge is an area of high pressure that extends north from the equator during the summer months and contracts southward in the winter.
The high pressure keeps the rain away, producing dry, hot days.
“Usually, high pressures are either east of us or west of us and it allows us to get a little more rain coverage, thus we don’t get as warm because of more cloud cover,” he said. “But it just didn’t happen this summer.”
Bannon said southeast Louisiana was especially dry in July. He said there was a stretch between the end of June through the first week and a half of August that was “abnormally dry and unusually hot.”
Bannan said the amount and frequency of rainfall has returned to normal since.
