Don Paul: Lower humidity is coming, but it's still days away (2024)

We’ve been through a sultry week as forecast, with Friday’s scattered showers and localized downpours keeping the humidity quite high, but at least lowering temperatures. This past week had highs of 89, 89, 88, 84 and 88 through Thursday. July had three days with highs of 89 for Buffalo, but no 90-degree days, following the three 90-plus highs in June. Every month this year has been warmer than average in Buffalo, with the last below-average month – just barely – occurring in November. Globally, the world is on track to its warmest year on record, surpassing the previous record set in 2023.

In the big picture, July broke a streak of consecutive warmest months on record globally, by coming in as the second warmest.

But locally, Buffalo’s warming trend was more modest. Our monthly mean temperature was 2.5 degrees above average, as opposed to extraordinary positive anomalies over much of the west, the south and parts of New England. Looking at temperature anomalies across the lower 48, it can be seen that Western New York was more on the fringe of the July warmth, with some actual cooling in central parts of the country, some of it due to active convection and cloud cover.

By looking at the legend, our region was warmer but nowhere near our warmest July. As for monthly rainfall, coverage is nearly always very uneven during summertime convection. Buffalo finished -.36 inch below average, but abnormally dry conditions were observed only in a narrow sliver of the far Southern Tier.

The weekend starts “less wet” than Friday, but probably not by much. There is poor agreement between models on the amount of coverage for showers and convective cells, though it does appear there will be less coverage Saturday than during Friday. With an area of low pressure slowly pulling away from us during the afternoon, it appears shower and thunderstorm chances will begin to diminish later in the day on the Niagara Frontier. However, that leaves the majority of the day with a chance of scattered and occasional activity, as depicted in this model during early afternoon.

A steady rain is unlikely, but outdoor plans will be difficult to make until the shower threat recedes toward evening, from northwest to southeast. The threat of isolated downpours will be greatest well south and southeast of the metro area, as estimated by the Weather Prediction Center/WPC.

You can track any rainfall on this automatically updating Buffalo National Weather Service radar link.

Sunday will bring notable improvement with a partly sunny sky and slightly lower humidity. The high should reach the low-mid 80s, and the southwest breeze comes up to 10-15 mph, making for a bit more comfort in a still fairly muggy air mass. Wave heights on both lakes will increase to 1-2 feet, a little choppier on Lake Erie.

With the proximity of a frontal boundary, a stray shower on Monday can’t be ruled out. Most of the day will be rain free with a partly sunny sky, a high near 84, and it will remain somewhat humid.

On Tuesday, a cold front will lie south of our region, and a ripple of low pressure on the front could bring a few showers to the Southern Tier. But the nose of a weak Canadian high pressure ridge to our northwest should hold our high temps to the mid 70s.

Tuesday night better sleeping weather will arrive with Wednesday morning lows in the upper 50s. On Wednesday, sunshine will be more abundant and dew points will be slipping to the comfortable low-mid 50s as high temps reach the upper 70s.

Thursday will still offer comfortable humidity with a partly sunny sky and highs again in the upper 70s. Friday looks dry as well, with similar temperatures and dew points. This will be a nice stretch of days and, for many, a welcome reprieve from the sultry conditions which prevailed this past week.

It's also good news for the Erie County Fair, with little chance for any interrupting showers during the first three days, and much more comfortable conditions than is often the case while hitting the pavement. Looking into precipitation chances beyond Day 7 is risky business, but extended range models and ensembles offer hopeful signs for next weekend both in terms of comfort and probable dry conditions.

There are no hints of sultry weather returning into the start of the following week either. The ensembles are keeping the hot ridge suppressed well to the south, unlike during that hot week we experienced in June when the ridge migrated into the northeast.

CPC seems to concur with this thinking in the 8-14 day outlook, favoring seasonable temperatures in our region.

Midwinter warming in Antarctica

Scientists have reported to the Washington Post an extraordinary second heat wave of this winter in East Antarctica. Temperatures recently were running more than 50 degrees above average, with this heat wave expected to persist through at least next week. This is a vast region, and East Antarctica covers the majority of that continent. This ongoing anomaly is currently the largest positive temperature anomaly on the planet, despite most news coverage centering on summer heat in the Northern Hemisphere. Some of this record midwinter warming may be tied to what’s called a sudden stratospheric warming, quite rare above the far southern latitude.

The warming over East Antarctica has pushed the colder air toward New Zealand, southern Africa and southern South America, producing harsh cold outbreaks in those places. The Arctic has been warming two to three times faster than the rest of the globe, largely due to the loss of reflective snow and ice cover. Now, Antarctica has reached a threshold of a two times faster warming rate. This kind of warming is leading to larger rates of Antarctic land ice, which will contribute to more rapid rates of sea level rise, unlike Arctic sea ice melt. The warming is exceeding predicted warming in climate models, and is a noteworthy signal of accelerating global warming.

Tropical disturbance heading to the eastern Gulf of Mexico

At the time of this writing, a tropical disturbance near Cuba remained somewhat disorganized, but most tropical and nontropical models are projecting this system to enter the eastern Gulf where it will become a tropical depression and evolve into a tropical cyclone. Uncertain intensification and very likely slowing of forward motion may pose a significant flooding rain threat to the Florida Gulf coast or other parts of the Gulf. This seven-day National Hurricane Center outlook will automatically update.

The two-day outlook will have more frequent updates, and the NHC site will supply interested parties with the most reliable and frequently updated information when this system begins to become better organized.

Here is a preliminary track forecast, which will update every six hours. At this time, NHC is not predicting intensification beyond tropical storm strength. Of course, that intensity forecast is subject to change, with little disruptive wind shear and extremely warm southeast Gulf water temperatures.