When the weather doesn't change: rainy streaks, dry streaks, cloudy streaks and sunny streaks

You've probably heard people say something like this:  "We have a saying around here.  If you don't like the weather, wait a minute."  Almost everywhere I've visited, I've heard some variant of this expression.  It always struck me as funny, because it implies some kind of unique changeability in the local weather, and yet people everywhere seem to say this!

I've certainly heard people say this about Victoria, but if anything, I think that what's more unique about Victoria's weather, at least compared with other places in Canada, is not its changeability - lots of places have changeable weather - but its stability.  For one thing, the temperatures tend not to fluctuate as much as they do in other parts of Canada.  In addition, we often get long stretches of similar weather, which can be both good and bad.  In the summer, we get long stretches of sunny, dry weather, but in the late fall and winter we often get long stretches of cloudy and rainy weather.  I thought I would take a look at the longest such stretches ever recorded in Victoria.

Let's start with precipitation.  The greatest number of consecutive days with measurable rainfall at the Victoria Gonzales weather station was 29 days: November 2-30, 2006.  Keep in mind that this doesn't mean it rained non-stop for 29 days; it just means that there was at least 0.2 mm of rain measured during each of those days.  That means it could be sunny all day, then a brief sprinkle of rain in the evening, and it would still be considered a day with measurable precipitation.  In fact, there was nearly 40 hours of sunshine recorded during this 29-day rainy streak, an average of nearly 1.4 hours per day.   Nonetheless, 29 days in a row with measurable rainfall is a long stretch!  The second longest stretch was 23 days and the third longest was 20 days.

On the flip side, the longest stretch without precipitation was 63 days, from June 15 to August 16, 1926.  The second longest stretch was 54 days, from July 17 to September 8, 1986.  During that stretch, there were 605 hours of sunshine recorded, or an average of 11.4 hours per day.  The third longest dry streak was 51 days, from July 7 to August 26, 1951.  Although shorter, that stretch came with even more sunshine: 653 hours, or an average of 12.8 hours per day.  There was a tie for the fourth longest dry streak: 46 days in both 1985 and 1991.  The latter streak is unusual in that it didn't occur during July or August; it was from September 1 to October 16, 1991.  Lengthy dry streaks are quite common in Victoria during the summer drought period.  Over the past 105 years, the average summer dry streak in Victoria has been 29 days.

Consecutive sunless days are actually much less common in Victoria than consecutive days with rainfall.  The longest stretch of days with no measurable sunshine was 9 days, from January 6-14, 1967.  You only need to have 0.1 hours of sunshine - 6 minutes - in a day in order for it to be considered a day with measurable sunshine, so you can see why really long stretches might be uncommon.  However, even if you look at consecutive days with less than 1 hour of sunshine, the longest stretch is still only 10 days, from December 8-17, 1980.  The longest stretch of days with less than 2 hours of sunshine is 12 days, recorded in both 1953 and 1971.  So you can see that long stretches with little or no sunshine are actually quite rare in Victoria.

Finally, if you look at the longest stretch of days with measurable sunshine, it was 124 days from May 27 to September 27, 1986.  Perhaps not surprisingly, this period included the record breaking 54 day dry streak discussed above.  Measurable sunshine is a pretty low bar, since you only need at least 0.1 hours of sunshine each day.  If you look at number of consecutive days with at least 8 hours of sunshine, the record is 32 days, from July 17 to August 17, 1977.  During this very sunny period, there were 434 hours of sunshine, and in fact all but one day during this period had more than 10 hours of sunshine and all but 5 days had more than 13 hours of sunshine.   Another remarkable sunny stretch occurred in 1985, when there was 635 hours of sunshine from June 15 to July 29, an average of 14.1 hours per day.  There was just one day during this 45-day stretch with less than 10 hours of sunshine, and a total of just 3 days with less than 12 hours of sunshine.  Perhaps not surprisingly, this stretch included most of July 1985, which was the sunniest calendar month on record at Victoria Gonzales, with 426 hours of sunshine.

What's the chance of rain and the likelihood of sunshine throughout the year in Victoria?

The chart below shows the % chance of precipitation and the % of possible sunshine on any given day during the year in Victoria.  It's really striking how the likelihood of precipitation and sunshine form a mirror image of each other.

Let's start by looking at the blue line - the chance of precipitation on any given day.  This starts in the 50-60% range during January and February, drops below 50% in March, and gradually declines until it reaches about 20% in June and early July.  Then we see something that is very distinctive of the climate in our area - a sharp drop down to about a 10% chance of rain on any given day from roughly the second week of July until mid-August.  That's definitely the time to plan your camping trip or outdoor event if you want to almost guarantee dry weather!  Beginning in mid-August, the chance of rain begins to increase, back to about 20% by the end of August, then gradually increases to about 25% by the end of September.  Unlike the spring, when there is a very gradual decrease in the likelihood of rain, the increase in the fall is much more abrupt, doubling from roughly 25% at the end of September to more than 50% by the end of October.  November and December put the chance of precipitation back in the 50-60% range where they started the year.

This pattern is quite different from other locations in Canada.  In Toronto, for example, the chance of precipitation on any given day varies much less throughout the year, from a high of about 50% during the winter months dropping to 30-35% during the summer.  The pattern is even more different in the Prairies.  In Calgary, there is only a 20-25% of precipitation on any given day during the winter months, but that increases to a 40-50% chance during June and July.

As I mentioned earlier, the % of possible sunshine in Victoria - the red line on the chart - follows almost the exact opposite pattern that chance of precipitation does throughout the year.  Victoria gets less than 30% of possible sunshine in December and January.  This gradually increases to about 60% by the beginning of May and stays at that level until the very beginning of July.  Then just as the chance of precipitation plummets from 20% down to 10% in the second week of July, the % of possible sunshine shoots up from about 60% to over 80%.  Again, this is the time to plan those outdoor activities!  The % of possible sunshine begins to drop off in the second week of August, and by the end of the month it is back down around 60%.  Possible sunshine declines very gradually at around 55% through September and the first half of October, then there is a sudden drop down to 30% by the beginning of November.  I've always noticed that the first half of October tends to have much nicer weather in Victoria than the second half -there's often a very abrupt change midway through the month - so it was nice to see this validated by the statistics!

In some ways, the seasonal pattern of sunshine in Victoria is quite similar to that in Toronto, where % of possible sunshine varies from about 30% during November, December, and January then gradually increases to around 60% in July before gradually declining once again.  The big difference is that Toronto doesn't experience Victoria's very high midsummer sunshine levels (80%).  So why is that?  As I explained in this post, the main reason is the North Pacific High, which tends to park itself over the northeastern Pacific in the summer months, deflecting weather systems to the north and providing Victoria with sunny, dry weather.  This is enhanced by the Olympic Mountain rain shadow and by Victoria's location surrounded by the cool water of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, which inhibits the formation of convective clouds and thunderstorms, resulting in exceptionally clear skies in the summer.  That's also why Victoria holds the record for the sunniest month ever recorded in Canada, outside the far north (in fact it holds the top three spots).

I should just mention one more thing.  While I have talked about the chance of precipitation and the % of possible sunshine as forming mirror images of each other, you should note that the way we're measuring chance of rain versus chance of sun is quite different.  For precipitation, we're looking at the % chance of any measurable precipitation on a given day.  That means a day where it there is a light shower for 10 minutes resulting in 0.2 mm of rain would be classed as a day with precipitation.  On the other hand, for sunshine we are not looking at the % chance of measurable sunshine, we are looking at % of possible sunshine.  The % chance of measurable sunshine would be much higher: throughout the year, Victoria averages about 51% of possible sunshine, but on average there is measurable sunshine (at least 0.1 hours) on 317.7 days, or 87% of days during the year.    So just keep in mind that while the chart above might make it seen like the likelihood of rain and sunshine is about the same in Victoria - just a mirror image - in fact we get a lot more hours of sunshine annually than we get daylight hours with rainfall.

How often does it snow in Victoria?

It's been a while since we saw a scene like this (from 2006) in Victoria - four years, in fact!

The last time there was more than 1 cm of snow on the ground in Victoria was January 20, 2012 – four years ago tomorrow, and there’s a good chance that we will make it through the rest of this winter without snow.  Even by Victoria standards, that’s an unusually long snowless stretch.  In fact, it’s the longest snowless stretch since they began recording snow depth at Victoria Gonzales in 1955.  The second longest stretch was from February 20, 1986 to February 15, 1989 – just short of three years.   

How often does it snow in Victoria?  That’s a question that residents and non-residents frequently ask, and I have heard a lot of different answers.  Some people may think it never snows in Victoria, while others will claim it snows every winter.  I already talked about the general patterns for snow in Victoria in an earlier post, but I thought I would dig a bit more deeper into the statistics to get a better sense of just how often we actually get snow.

There are two ways of measuring snow.  The first method is to measure snowfall.  The second method is to measure the amount of snow that actually accumulates on the ground.  This can be quite different since often when it does snow in Victoria it doesn’t actually “stick” – it just melts as it hits the ground.  This would still be considered snowfall, but there would be no measured accumulation on the ground. 

Let’s first look at snowfall.  As I mentioned in my earlier post of snow, the average annual snowfall in Victoria is 20 cm.  The chart below shows average monthly snowfall in Victoria over the past 30 years (1981-2010). 

While the chart above shows average monthly snowfall, it doesn't say anything about how often Victoria actually gets snows during a given month.  The table below shows the percentage of years during 1981-2010 when there has been measurable snowfall during a given month.  The results are quite interesting.  For example, even though Victoria's "average" snowfall for December is 9 cm, the table shows that Victoria has only received measurable snowfall during 37% of Decembers between 1981 and 2010. In other words, in most Decembers it doesn't snow at all.  In fact, this is true for every month.  January is most likely to get at least some snow (47% of the time), but it still falls short of a majority of years.  In Victoria, snowfall averages tend to be skewed because most years there is little or no snow, but every several years there can be a relatively big snowfall in a given month.  

Looking at the year as a whole, 93% of winters get at least 0.2 cm of snow and (as shown in the second column) 74% of winters get at least 5 cm of snow.   

I always smile when I hear breathless reports from back east about a snowstorm that delivered “a month’s worth” of snow in a few days.  In Victoria, because big snowfalls are so infrequent, it’s quite common that when it does snow we’ll get a whole month’s worth or even a whole winter’s worth of snow in one storm.  An extreme example of this was the Blizzard of 1996, when Victoria received an amazing 107 cm of snow over 4 days in late December.  That’s the equivalent to five year’s worth of snow!  Even more impressive, we received more snow during those 4 days than we received in the following 9 winters combined!  That one snowfall in December 1996, accounted for nearly 40% of all December snowfall over a 30 year period and without it, average December snowfall in Victoria would be closer to 5 cm than 9 cm.

Instead of average snowfall, we could instead look at median snowfall.  The median is the point where half the years are above and half the years are below.  Since, as the table shows, there are no months where it has snowed the majority of years during 1981-2010, the median monthly snowfall for Victoria is 0 for every month.  While the majority of years there is no snowfall in any given month, there usually is at least some snow at some point during most winters.  The table shows that 74% of winters record at least 5 cm of snow.  The median winter snowfall is 13 cm – meaning half of winters get more than this amount and half get less.  

Now let’s look at snow on the ground.  Having snow actually accumulate on the ground is less common in Victoria than having snowfall.  Only 7% of Victoria winters during 1981-2010 recorded no measurable snowfall, but 30% of winters during the same period recorded no days with more than 1 cm of snow on the ground.  Victoria gets an average of 4.8 days (or a median of 3 days) each winter with more than 1 cm of snow on the ground.  

As mentioned at the beginning of this blog, Victoria has now experienced 3 winters in a row (2012/13, 2013/14, and 2014/15) without accumulating more than 1 cm of snow, and we're half way through our fourth snowless winter.

The Sunniest Month in Canadian History

I've already mentioned that Victoria is the sunniest place in B.C. and one of the sunniest cities in Canada.  Well, here's some more proof of just how sunny it is here.  I came across the following list of the sunniest months ever recorded in Canada.  (This is based on Environment Canada measurements from all ten provinces, but doesn't include locations in the territories  since some northern locations get 24 hour daylight in June and July.)  Amazingly, while the statistics came from hundreds of weather sites across Canada, Victoria Gonzales or Victoria Airport accounted for 5 of the 8 sunniest months on record, including the top 4 sunniest months ever recorded in Canada:

	Station	Month	Hours
1	Victoria Airport	July 2013	432.8
2	Victoria Gonzales	July 1985	426.0
3	Victoria Gonzales	July 1958	424.7
4	Victoria Airport	July 1985	421.5
5	Manyberries, AB	July 1985	414.0
6	Cranbrook, BC	July 1985	413.0
7	Medicine Hat, AB	July 1991	413.0
8	Victoria Gonzales	July 1960	410.7

Sunshine measurements stopped at Victoria Gonzales in 1988.  Gonzales typically gets about 6% more sunshine than the Victoria Airport, so if we had still been measuring sunshine at Gonzales in 2013, there is a very good chance that it would have topped the amount at the Victoria Airport, which currently holds the title of sunniest month on record in Canada.  So if you lived in Victoria in July 2013, then you can rightly claim that you experienced the sunniest month ever recorded in Canada, outside the Arctic!  If you've lived in Victoria since 1958, then you have experienced the top 3 sunniest months in Canadian history!

So why is Victoria so sunny in the summer?  The main reason is the North Pacific High, which tends to park itself over the northeastern Pacific in the summer months, deflecting weather systems to the north and providing B.C.'s South Coast with generally sunny, dry weather.  In Victoria, this is enhanced by the Olympic Mountain rain shadow effect.  Victoria's location, surrounded by the cool water of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, also helps since it inhibits the formation of convective clouds (the type that form thunderstorms), resulting in exceptionally clear skies in the summer.

A nice rain shadow yesterday

I've mentioned how the Olympic Mountain rain shadow has such a profound impact on Victoria's climate.  Thanks to this effect, the Victoria Gonzales weather station averages only 641 mm of precipitation annually, compared  more than 1000 mm in Metchosin (20 km west) and more than 3500 mm at Port Renfrew (80 km west on the exposed southwest coast of Vancouver Island).

Yesterday, we had a good example of a rain shadow.  Here's what the radar looked like around midday yesterday:

You can see there is a pretty clear hole in the rain over Victoria, as well as the northeast Olympic Peninsula.  That "hole" persisted for most of the day and there were only a couple of light sprinkles.  Meanwhile, there was steady rain all day up at the Victoria Airport, with rain recorded every hour from 4 am until midnight yesterday.

The precipitation totals from yesterday also tell the story.  There was just 1.4 mm of rain at Victoria Gonzales and 1.5 mm of rain at the University of Victoria weather station.  At the Esquimalt weather station, about 8 km west of Gonzales, there was 5 mm of rain.  At the Victoria Airport, 25 km north of Victoria, there was more than 14 mm of rain - ten times the amount that fell at Gonzales.  Rainfall totals at up-Island locations were even higher: 26 mm in Duncan, 24 mm in Nanaimo and 28 mm in Campbell River.

The rain shadow tends to be centered over the eastern part of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, as shown in the map below from the informative website OlympicRainShadow.com.

Sequim and Port Townsend, Washington, which are located closest to the center, feel the greatest impact from the rain shadow.  Port Townsend averages only 484 mm of annual precipitation, while Sequim receives a mere 407 mm.  A little further west, Port Angeles averages 642 mm - roughly the same as Victoria Gonzales.  The rain shadow area is not static; it tends to wobble around, so sometimes Victoria is in the rain shadow while other times it is just off to our southeast.  Because Victoria is on the northwestern edge of the rain shadow, areas immediately to our west and north see little or no impact from it (although areas to the north, including the Victoria Airport and the Gulf Islands, do benefit from the less potent rain shadow produced by the lower Vancouver Island mountains).

The Victoria Gonzales weather station is located in that part of the Victoria region that is most impacted by the rain shadow.  Interestingly, the Victoria School-Based Weather Station Network opened a weather station on Trial Island in 2013.  Trial Island is located off the south coast of Oak Bay, about 2 km southeast of Victoria Gonzales, so it is the piece of land in the Victoria Region that is closest to the rain shadow.  Annual data for 2014 and 2015 show that the Trial Island station received only about 400 mm of rain in each of these years, substantially lower than Gonzales.  I'm not sure how accurate these measurements are, and I suspect they may underestimate the rainfall at Trial Island somewhat, but it is likely that the Trial Island weather station occupies the driest site measured on the British Columbia coast, a title long held by Victoria Gonzales.

Does Victoria have a Mediterranean Climate?

You may have seen Victoria described as having a Mediterranean or perhaps a sub-Mediterranean climate.  Is this just local boosterism?  People are sometimes skeptical about these claims of a Mediterranean climate.  After all, while we have great weather in Victoria, it’s not exactly southern California or the Greek Islands.  Despite the skepticism, there is in fact truth to these claims. 

The Koppen classification system, developed by Russian German climatologist Wladimir Koppen in the late 19^th century,  is one of the most widely used climate classification systems in the world.  Under the Koppen system, the world’s climates are classified into five main groups: A – Tropical, B – Dry, C – Temperate, D – Continental, and E – Polar.  Victoria falls in the the Temperate group, which is further classified based on the annual precipitation pattern, indicated by the second letter in the classification: s for dry summer, w for dry winter, and f for precipitation throughout the year.   So Cf would include Oceanic climates, like London, England, while Cs climates are termed Mediterranean.  To meet the criteria for a Cs climate, summer months must have less than one third the precipitation as the wettest winter month, and summer months must have less than 30 mm of precipitation.  Victoria easily meets these criteria, with July rainfall of just 13 mm – less than one tenth of our wettest month in December.  Mediterranean climates are further classified as Csa or Csb, depending on whether summers are hot (mean monthly temperature above 22 C) or warm (mean monthly temperature below 22 C).  Based on all these criteria, Victoria’s climate is classed as Csb, or warm summer Mediterranean.  Other locations with a Csb climate include San Francisco, Cape Town, and Porto, Portugal. 

The charts below show the monthly precipitation in Victoria, San Francisco, and London, England.  All three cities have roughly similar total annual precipitation - about 600 mm.  However, while precipitation in London is evenly distributed throughout the year, Victoria and San Francisco have the distinctive Mediterranean pattern of winter rainy season and summer drought   While Victoria's summer drought period is not quite so intense as San Francisco's, the overall pattern is still the same.

Further evidence of our Mediterranean climate can be seen in Victoria’s native vegetation, which tends to be a strong expression of the local climate.   While the vegetation of northern and western Vancouver Island can be classified as temperate rainforest, the southern and eastern coasts of the Island have a drier Coastal Douglas Fir Ecosystem.  In the driest parts of this ecosystem, particularly around Victoria, a sub-class – Garry Oak Meadow – can be found.  This is essentially a temperate savannah, with clumps of oak forest interspersed with meadows and more open prairies.  The Garry Oak is the only native oak tree in Western Canada.  Garry Oak Meadow is now an extremely rare and threatened ecosystem in Canada since most of it has been covered by development in the Victoria area.  The picture below shows a Garry Oak meadow in Uplands Park near Victoria, taken in April when the wildflowers are blooming and before the meadow dries out during the summer drought.    

This type of ecosystem can be found in Oregon’s Willamette Valley, and also stretches down into parts of central California.   Sometimes when I have been driving down in California I will pass through an area of low hills covered with golden grass and clumps of oak trees, and it is striking how much it looks like the undeveloped parts of Victoria in the summer.

The following quote is an indication of how different the natural vegetation in Victoria is from surrounding regions along the B.C. coast.  It comes from Sir James Douglas, the first Governor of Vancouver Island, when he was surveying the region for a potential location for Fort Victoria in February 1843:

“The place itself appears a perfect ‘Eden’ in the midst of the dreary wilderness of the North west coast, and so different is its general aspect from the wooded, rugged regions around that one might be pardoned for supposing it had dropped from the clouds into its present position.”

Douglas chose the site because it was surrounded by so much open meadow and prairie land.  Douglas was visiting Victoria in the spring, and seeing the luxuriant growth of the meadowland, he assumed that the area would be perfect for growing crops through the summer months, writing that  “the climate being also mild and pleasant, we ought to be able to grow every kind of grain raised in England”.   After his first summer in the region, Douglas had learned that Victoria’s dry summers would make agriculture more challenging than he’d originally thought, writing in a letter dated November 1843 that  “no rain fell between the 10th of June and 8th September at Fort Victoria” and that the residents of Victoria were “at times badly off for water”. 

So Where is El Nino?

El Nino has really started to make its presence felt in California over the past few days, with a series of storms bringing lots of rain to coastal areas - just what you would expect during an El Nino winter.  For Victoria, the conventional wisdom is that we tend to experience winters that are warmer and a bit drier than normal during El Nino years.  This year's El Nino has been touted as the largest one ever recorded, so has our winter weather lived up to the expectation so far?  Not really.

First, let's look in a little more detail at how El Nino usually impacts our winters in Victoria.  Over the past 30 winters, there have been 6 moderate or strong El Ninos: 1982-83, 1986-87, 1991-92, 1997-98, 2002-03, and 2009-10.

The table below looks at the monthly mean temperature in Victoria for December through March, comparing El Nino winters with the 30-year average.  Each month between December and March has been, on average, warmer during El Nino winters.  The difference is smaller in December and March (+0.8 degrees) but increases in January and especially February, when it peaks at a difference of +1.1 degrees.

           Mean Monthly Temperature

	Dec	Jan	Feb	Mar
1981-2010 ave.	5.3	5.9	6.5	7.9
El Nino winters	6.1	6.8	7.6	8.7
Difference	0.8	0.9	1.1	0.8

The next table compares average precipitation in Victoria during the same months.  The results are much less conclusive, with December and especially February being somewhat drier during El Nino winters, but January and March being slightly wetter.

    Average Monthly Precipitation (mm)

	Dec	Jan	Feb	Mar
81-10 ave.	95	104	61	51
El Nino	89	111	49	55
Difference	-6%	7%	-20%	8%

One aspect of our winters that has been significantly impacted by El Nino seems to be snowfall.  The 30-year average snowfall for Victoria is 20.1 cm.  However, for the 6 El Nino winters in the past 30 years, snowfall has averaged just 1.4 cm, or 7% of normal.  Now that's a significant difference!

So how has this winter stacked up?  December was 0.9 degrees above the 30-year average, or about what you'd expect for an El Nino winter.  However, that warmth all seemed to come in the first half of the month.  Late December, and so far in early January, temperatures have been below normal.  Precipitation in December was about 25% above normal, while so far in January it has been relatively dry.   So precipitation has been a mixed bag, but that seems to be the trend for El Nino winters in Victoria.  There has been no snow so far this winter in Victoria, so that certainly seems to follow the pattern we've seen in previous El Nino winters.  

For an El Nino that's been hyped as the biggest ever recorded, so far it seems a bit of a let down in Victoria.  The weather has been pretty chilly for about three weeks now.  One thing to keep in mind though, is that El Nino tends to have its greatest impacts in Victoria later in the winter, peaking in February.  Let's hope this monster El Nino brings us a really mild and dry February!

Turning the corner

One nice thing about this time of year, not only are the days getting longer but the temperatures are getting warmer.  Statistically, the coldest day of the year in Victoria is December 28, with an average high of 6.5 degrees.  Here we are on January 5, and the average temperature for this date is 7.3 (even though we were below average today).  The gradual warming will continue, with the average high temperature topping 8 degrees by January 26, 9 degrees by February 19, and 10 degrees by March 6.

The chart below, which shows the average daily high temperature in Victoria between November and March, illustrates this trend.  You can see that average temperatures fall off quickly in November, then level off during December.  There is a short period in late December when average termperatures reach the lowest level of the year.  There is a relatively sharp increase at the end of December and beginning of January when average temperatures jump from 6.5 to nearly 8 degrees, then a more gradual increase through the rest of January.  Temperatures start climbing more quickly again in February and March.

Victoria is actually pretty lucky in starting this warming trend so early in the winter.  In many places in eastern Canada, average temperatures don't start increasing until mid- to late-January.  In Toronto, for example, the mean temperature is -2.2 in December, -5.5 in January, and -4.5 in February.  In other words, January is the coldest month of the year, and February is 2 degrees colder than December.  In Victoria, December is the coldest month of the year, with a mean temperature of 5.3.  January is a bit milder, with a mean temperature of 5.9, and February is the mildest of the three winter months, with a mean temperature of 6.5 - 1.2 degrees warmer than December.

So count yourself lucky to be in Victoria.  It's early January and spring is just around the corner!

Monthly Review: December 2015

While, statistically, Victoria didn't experience a lot of extreme weather in December 2015, it was an interesting month.

The mean temperature for the month at Victoria Gonzales was 6.2 degrees, almost a degree warmer than the 30-year average of 5.3.  December saw an average daily high of 8.1 and an average low of 4.3, again warmer than the average high/low of 7.2 / 3.3.  However, these monthly averages mask what was almost two different months when it came to temperature.  The first half of the month was very mild - in fact the second mildest Dec 1-15 on record - with a mean temperature of 8.2 degrees and an average high/low of 10.0 / 6.3.  The second half of the month got much chillier - nearly 2 degrees below average - with a mean temperature of 4.4 and an average high/low of 6.3 / 2.5.

The warmest day of the month was 12.8 on December 8.  There were 7 days when the temperature topped 10 degrees, all between Dec. 3 and 11th.  The coldest overnight low of the month was -0.9 on December 31.  There were 2 nights when the overnight temperature dropped below freezing - December 30 and 31.  In an average December, Victoria Gonzales gets 3 nights below 0.

December was a rather wet month, with rainfall measured on 21 days, compared with the average 17.5 days for December.  Total precipitation for the  month - all rain - was 120.2 mm, 27% more than the December average of 94.8 mm.  Precipitation was also above normal at the Victoria Airport: 163.9 mm compared with the average of 142.5.  To our south, it was even wetter: Seattle had its second wettest December on record, with 285 mm and Portland had its wettest December on record with 387 mm!  The record for Victoria Gonzales is 331 mm back in December 1917.

With the continuing relatively  mild weather in December, there was no snow recorded.  The last time we saw any snow fall was more than a year ago, when 1 cm fell on November 29, 2014.  The last time we had more than 1 cm actually accumulate on the ground was January 20, 2012 - almost 4 years ago.

We experienced a lot of wind in Victoria in December, particularly during the first part of the month when there were a series of storms.  The peak wind was 104 km/hr gust on December 12.  Wind gusts topped 80 km/hr on three other days.

Year in Review: 2015

It's New Year's Day, a good time to review the weather we experienced in Victoria during 2015.

The most significant feature of the weather in 2015 was the warmth.  2015 was the warmest year on record at Victoria Gonzales, with the recording-keeping going back over 100 years to 1898.  The mean annual temperature was 11.7 degrees compared with the 1981-2010 average of 10.6 degrees.  The old record was 11.5 degrees in 2004.  Ten of the months during 2015 were warmer than normal - only September and November were below average.

Some months also broke temperature records.  February 2015 was by far the warmest February on record at Victoria Gonzales, with a mean temperature of 8.9 degrees and an average daily max/min of 11.2 / 6.6.  February was 2.4 degrees above the average of 6.5 and smashed the old record of 8.2 degrees by a wide margin.  In addition, June 2015 tied with June 2003 as the warmest on record, with a mean temperature of 16.1 degrees and an average daily max/min of 20.7 / 11.5.  Average mean temperature for June at Victoria Gonzales is 14.5.  The warmest month of the year was July, with a mean temperature of 17.6 degrees.  That makes it the third warmest July on record at Victoria Gonzales, after July 2004 (17.8) and July 1958 (17.7).  July 2015 also tied with August 1997 as the fourth warmest month on record at Victoria Gonzales.

Victoria also experienced its warmest summer on record in 2015, with a mean temperature of 16.9 degrees for June, July, and August combined compared with a normal summer temperature of 15.6 degrees.  The old record was 16.8 degrees in 2004.

The warmest temperature of the year was 31.3 degrees on July 30.  Despite 2015 being such a warm year on average, that date was the only time the temperature topped 30 degrees, compared with 5 days in 2004.  So 2015 was right on the average for Victoria Gonzales of 1 day with temperatures above 30.  We did get more than our usual number of days with temperatures above 25 degrees - 12 days compared with the average of 8.6 days.  The coldest temperature was -0.9 degrees reached on the very last day of the year - December 31.  There were just 4 days in 2015 when the overnight temperature dropped below freezing, compared with the normal 11 days.

2015 will also be remembered for the dry late spring and summer.  While summer drought is not in the least unusual in Victoria, this year was exceptional, particularly in the spring and early summer.  May 2015 was the driest on record at Victoria Gonzales, with just 1.8 mm of rain.  During the four month period from April 1 to July 31, just 24.6 mm of rain fell in Victoria compared with the usual 92.7 mm.  That makes it the driest April to July period on record in Victoria.

Despite this dry spell, above average rainfall during most of the rest of the year - especially during the last three months of the year - resulted in a wetter than average year with 735 mm compared with the average 641 mm.

Victoria recorded no snowfall during 2015.  This is the first calendar year since 1999 with absolutely  no snow.  Sometimes, Victoria will get a few snow flurries, even if it doesn't stick, but this year we didn't even get that.  With no snow falling,  Victoria continued its streak of winters with no snow accumulating on the ground.  The last time we saw at least 1 cm of snow on the ground was back in January 2012 - almost four years ago.

Victoria Gonzales Weather Summary for 2015
Month	Max	Min	Average	Rain	Snow
	° C	° C	° C	mm	cm
Jan	9.0	5.2	7.1	96.1	-
Feb	11.2	6.6	8.9	82.8	-
Mar	12.4	6.5	9.5	82.3	-
Apr	13.6	6.5	10.1	10.8	-
May	17.1	9.2	13.2	1.8	-
Jun	20.7	11.5	16.1	3.8	-
Jul	22.0	13.0	17.6	8.2	-
Aug	21.1	12.6	16.9	26.5	-
Sep	17.8	10.6	14.2	38.6	-
Oct	15.5	10.0	12.8	108.4	-
Nov	9.4	4.6	7.0	155.9	-
Dec	8.1	4.3	6.2	120.2	-
Annual	14.8	8.4	11.7	735.4	-

What is the sunniest location in British Columbia? Victoria

Victoria has a well-known reputation for having the mildest climate in Canada, but fewer people seem to be aware that it is also among Canada's sunniest cities, with an average annual 2,203 hours.  Sunshine was measured at Victoria Gonzales from 1914 to 1988, so this average was calculated based on the most recent 30-year period (1958-88) rather than the standard 30-year climate normal period (currently 1981-2010).

The Olympic Mountain rainshadow, discussed earlier for its impact on precipitation in Victora, also affects the amount of sunshine.  As winds flow down over the Olympics, the sinking air warms and dries, often resulting in a hole in the clouds.  In fact this is so prevalent that airplane pilots often use this "hole in the clouds" as part of the visual navigation in the region around Victoria.

Victoria is the sunniest city in B.C. and one of the sunniest cities in Canada.  Compared with 2,203 hours at Victoria Gonzales, the Victoria Airport averages 2,109 hours and Vancouver Airport gets 1938 hours.  People are often surprised that Victoria gets more annual sunshine than the "sunny Okanagan" and other spots in the B.C. interior, including Kelowna (1949 hours), Penticton (1923 hours), and Kamloops (2,080 hours).  Victoria also gets more sunshine than places like Toronto (2,066 hours), Montreal (2,051 hours).  In Canada, only Prairie cities like Calgary (2,396 hours) get more annual sunshine than Victoria.

Obviously, the  amount of sunshine varies throughout the year.  In part, this is due to the seasonal changes in day length: Victoria gets roughly 16 hours of daylight in late June, but only about half that amount in late December.  In addition, the percent of possible sunshine in Victoria varies significantly throughout the year.  In July, it's sunny in Victoria for 70% of daylight hours while in December it is only sunny for 24% of possible daylight hours.  As a result of these two factors, sunshine in Victoria ranges from an average 338 hours in July (nearly 11 hours per day on average) to just 63 hours in December (about two hours per day).  Late spring and summer tends to be very sunny in Victoria, and just four months - May, June, July, and August - account for 54% of Victoria's annual sunshine.  During the summer months, Victoria gets more sunshine than any other major city in Canada, including those on the Prairies.

On average, Victoria gets 317 days each year with  at least some measurable sunshine.  Not surprisingly, virtually every day in July -  30.3 out of 31 days - has measurable sunshine.  However, even in sometimes gloomy December, there is at least some sunshine on an average 20.5 out of 31 days.  On the flip side, Victoria gets just 48 days annually with no sunshine, compared with 76 days in Vancouver, 60 days in Toronto, and 32 days in Calgary.

The sunniest month on record at Victoria Gonzales was 426 hours in July 1985.  That works out to an average of nearly 14 hours of sunshine per day.  In July 2013, 432.8 hours of sunshine was recorded at the Victoria Airport - the sunniest month on record for any location in Canada (not including the Territories where northern locations can get 24 hours sunshine during the summer, resulting in very high monthly totals).  While sunshine was no longer being recorded at Victoria Gonzales in 2013, Gonzales on average gets about 6% more sunshine than the Airport, so there is a good chance that it received even more sunshine than the Airport site.  The least sunny month ever recorded at Victoria Gonzales was January 1982, with just 28.2 hours of sunshine - less than one hour per day.

The sunniest year on record in Victoria was 1951 when 2545 hours of sunshine were recorded, making it the sunniest year recorded for any location in B.C.  The least sunny year in Victoria was way back in 1914 with just 1948 hours of sunshine, but keep in mind that this is still more than the average annual sunshine in Vancouver.

	Hours	% possible	Days with measurable
Jan	69.8	25.5%	21.3
Feb	97.9	34.1%	22.5
Mar	152.9	41.5%	27.9
Apr	195.7	47.8%	28.7
May	274.0	58.2%	29.9
Jun	281.9	58.6%	28.8
Jul	338.3	69.7%	30.3
Aug	294.3	66.2%	29.6
Sep	206.5	54.5%	28.2
Oct	145.9	43.4%	26.5
Nov	82.6	29.7%	22.6
Dec	63.2	24.3%	20.5
Annual	2202.9	46.3%	316.8