2020 weather in Victoria: year in review

Overall, Victoria's weather in 2020 was wetter than normal, but with close to average temperatures.

The mean temperature at Victoria Gonzales for 2020 was 10.7 degrees C, the same as in 2019 and right on the 1991-2020 30-year average.

Just 4 months had above average temperatures in 2020.  January was slightly (0.1 degree) above normal, while May, September, and December were each about 1 degree above normal.  Conversely, there were 8  months with below average temperatures in 2020.  March was the most unusual, with temperatures averaging 1.2 degrees below normal.  The other months were all less than 0.5 degrees below normal.  

The warmest temperature of 2020 was on August 16, with a temperature of 29.5 C.  There were 12 days in 2020 with daily maximums above 25 degrees, compared with the average of 9 days.  There were brief warm spells in May (peaking at 27.8 C on May 10), July (peaking at 29.1 C on July 26), August, and September (peaking at 29.4 C on September 10).  

The coldest temperature of 2020 was -5.7 C on January 14.  That was the coldest temperature recorded at Victoria Gonzales in more than 6 years.  There were 8 days in 2020 when the temperature went below 0, just less than the long-term average of 9.5 days.  Of those days when temperatures dropped below freezing, 6 were in January while 2 were in March.

The chart below shows the daily maximum and minimum temperatures at Victoria Gonzales in 2020, compared with the long-term normal temperatures.  You can the brief cold snap in mid-January, early March, and late October.  You can also see the occasional warm spikes, in May, July, August, and September.

Victoria received 837 mm of precipitation in 2020, nearly 30% more than the long-term average of 656 mm.  In fact, 2020 was the wettest year in Victoria in more than 20 years.  The 3 winter months - January, February, and December - were all wetter than normal in 2020.  January was particularly wet, with roughly double the normal precipitation, and it accounted for more than half of the surplus rainfall in 2020.   In contrast, the remaining 9 months saw close to normal rainfall overall, though March was significantly drier than normal while September was wetter than normal.

The chart below shows daily and cumulative precipitation at Victoria Gonzales for 2020.  You can see the heavy rainfall in January, and as a result, the cumulative rainfall quickly exceeded the 30-year average, and stayed above the average for the entire year.  

There were 139 days with measurable precipitation in 2020, compared with the normal of 132 days.  By far the wettest day of the year was December 21, when 55 mm of rain fell (at times mixed with a little wet snow).  In fact, this was the wettest day recorded at Victoria Gonzales in almost 5 years.  At the nearby University of Victoria weather station, 70 mm of rain was recorded, making it the wettest day there in 15 years.  There were 3 other days with more than 25 mm of rain, in January and early February.  On average, Victoria gets 2.9 days per year with 25 mm or more precipitation.   The longest dry stretch was 22 days, from July 12 to August 2.  This is a little shorter than the average summer drought period of 27 days with no rainfall.

The chart below compares annual precipitation at Victoria Gonzales in 2020 with other locations in the region.  Thanks to its rainshadow location, Victoria is typically drier than most other locations, and that was the case in 2020, though  not by as much as it usually is.  That's because precipitation at Victoria Gonzales was 28% above normal in 2020, while it was just 20% above normal at the Victoria Airport (in North Saanich) and 16% above normal in Seattle.  Vancouver actually saw precipitation that was 6% below normal in 2020, though the amount (1428 mm) was still 70% higher than Victoria.  On average, Vancouver Harbour gets 132% more precipitation than Victoria Gonzales.

Victoria had 23 cm of snow in 2020, compared with the average of 16 cm.  Nearly all the snow (22 cm) was in January, while there was just 1 cm of wet snow in December which did  not accumulate.  There were 5 days in 2020 with at least 2 cm of snow on the ground, all in January.  This is close to the annual average of 4.8 days with snow on the ground.

Sunshine was slightly above average in Victoria in 2020 thanks to above average sunshine in March, August, and December.  On the other hand, January and June were cloudier than normal.