Seattle tops record high temperature Sunday as spring warm trend continues
Temperatures in Seattle scorched past its record high mark Sunday, capping off yet another abnormally hot week this spring and foreshadowing the inevitable summer of drought that's fast approaching.
The mercury reached 81 degrees around 3 p.m. and stayed there well into the evening at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, according to the National Weather Service. That's 4 degrees higher than the 77-degree record originally set in 1992.
The old record was a relatively weak one, said Jacob DeFlitch, a meteorologist with the Weather Service. That's compared with an 85-degree record for May 4 or an 86-degree record for May 5.
But still, Sunday's warm spell sits within part of an overall warming trend that has hovered over the region for months and which shows no signs of abating any time soon.
This year Washington passed its third-warmest winter on record. Snowpack levels - which lagged all throughout the season - are now well below average and melting fast. State officials declared an unprecedented fourth drought emergency in a row in early April, which is supposed to be the height of the snowpack season.
This warming trend continues to be felt the world over as climate change hastens year after year. In the Pacific Northwest, one direct consequence is that precipitation will increasingly fall as rain rather than snow. That rain can't all be captured by the state's relatively scattered and relatively small reservoirs. And hot winters also melt the little snowpack that does accumulate earlier than normal.
All of this combines to form drought conditions. Summers become hotter and drier and begin earlier. With less snowpack melting into the warm months, that means less water to go around at a time when Washington's cities, farms, plants and animals need it more.
Spring is only about half over by now, DeFlitch said, but since March, temperatures recorded at Sea-Tac have averaged 53.3 degrees, well above average. Should the hot spell continue, that puts the region on track for its fifth-warmest spring since record keeping began in 1945, DeFlitch said.
The federal Climate Prediction Center forecasts temperatures likely to remain above normal through mid-May. Similarly, the center predicts precipitation levels to sit likely below normal levels.
Another compounding effect might be the El Niño conditions emerging on the horizon. This phenomenon, which brings warm tropical air into the Pacific Northwest, is likely to emerge in the weeks or months ahead and could well hold the region's climate at hotter and drier levels than normal throughout the summer.
Reporter Alex Halverson contributed to this story.
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