Sunday 7 June 2015

Ups and Downs in May


Another May, another May finishing close to or colder than normal. May 2015 finished 0.4°C below normal, marking the 6th colder than normal May in the last 8 years. We have not had a May that was at least 1.0°C above normal since 1991! However, 8 Mays finished over 1.0°C below normal in the same period.

There certainly was not a lack of summer-like warmth in May however. 8 days exceeded 25°C. Brief bursts of summer-like warmth were interrupted by significant cool downs in between.

The strongest storm of the month was an intense Colorado Low on the May Long Weekend. 40+ mm of rain fell along with winds gusts to 90 km/h. Snow even fell on Victoria Day, the latest occurrence of snow since 2002. Previously, snow had only fallen on May 18 4 times since 1872. Additionally, a rainfall record was also broken May 17 with 31.3 mm of rain. This broke the old record of 22.9 mm in 1903.