Hot weather will be making comeback in San Juan County after early-week respite
While Farmington residents may have seen their last 100-degree day for a while, the summertime heat is by no means over, even though San Juan County experienced a welcome cooldown earlier this week.
Annette Mokry, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Albuquerque, said the cooler temperatures and sporadic monsoon storms that rolled through the area last weekend and lingered into early this week were only a respite from the unusually hot summer the Four Corners has seen.
“It’s just a brief break, unfortunately,” she said. “The upper high (pressure system) has moved to the east of New Mexico, and that’s allowed a bit more moisture to move into the western side of the state, as well as allowing temperatures to cool down. But the chances for precipitation will decrease as we get later into the week, and the temperatures will be increasing day by day.”
Much of the second half of July in San Juan County was extremely hot, with the mercury at the Four Corners Regional Airport in Farmington hitting 100 degrees or more 14 times, Mokry said. That included an eight-day stretch from July 14 through July 21 when the airport reached triple digits, including a sizzling 104 degrees on July 17.
Mokry said an extended heat streak of that nature is unusual for the Farmington area, and the data seem to bear that out. According to National Weather Service records, San Juan County has averaged only one 100-degree day a year for the last 44 years at the agricultural sciences center in Aztec.
But this will be second consecutive abnormally hot summer Farmington has experienced. Last summer, the airport recorded temperatures of 100 degrees or more eight times, according to the weather service.
The good news is, Mokry said, is that even when temperatures warm back up later this week, they won’t go back to July levels.
“It doesn’t look like Farmington’s going to get back up to 100 degrees again,” she said. “Highs will hover into the mid 90s.”
The widespread showers and thunderstorms the county has seen over the past several days also will dissipate, she said, meaning a return to hot, sunny and dry weather is in the cards. It may be late August or even September before San Juan County could see the return of any monsoon conditions, she said.
That serves as bad news for Farmington, which already is well below average in terms of precipitation for the year. Mokry said the airport had received only 0.03 inches of precipitation for the entire month as of July 31 — a figure that was far below the normal monthly total of 0.61 inches.
The year-to-date figure is even worse, she said. As of July 31, only 3.96 inches of moisture had been recorded at the airport, while the normal total for that date is 7.5 inches.
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More than 86% of the county was categorized as being abnormally dry or in some form of drought on July 25, according to the U.S Drought Monitor. A week earlier, that figure was only approximately 63% — an indication of how quickly things are drying out. Three months ago, only approximately 53% of the county was experiencing drought or abnormally dry conditions.
Still, the long-range forecast holds some hope. With El Nino conditions prevailing in the eastern Pacific Ocean, conditions could be ripe for a wetter and cooler fall and winter this year, according to the weather service’s monsoon outlook. Mokry said a significant change in conditions could be coming in as little as two months.
“Things will be more active in October and November,” she said.
Mike Easterling can be reached at 505-564-4610 or measterling@daily-times.com. Support local journalism with a digital subscription: http://bit.ly/2I6TU0e.
This article originally appeared on Farmington Daily Times: Hot, dry weather expected to return to San Juan County over next week
