A look back at summer 2016

Now that August is over, meteorological summer (June, July, and August) is also over.  Summer 2016 started out a little more unsettled than usual in Victoria, but in the end it turned out to be very nice.

At Victoria Gonzales, there was a total of 41 mm of rain during June, July, and August.  That's a little drier than the 50 mm that Victoria receives on average during the summer, but nothing unusual.  In fact, about 40% of the summers at Victoria Gonzales over the past 118 years have been drier, with the driest summer (1970) receiving just 10.5 mm of rain during June, July, and August.  While this June was a little wetter than normal, July and August were both a little drier.  There were 15 days with measurable precipitation during the summer, which is right on average.

The chart below shows daily rainfall during summer 2016, and compares the cumulative rainfall with the 30-year average.  You can see that June and the first week in July was generally a little wetter than average, but then it was very dry until the last few days in August.  From July 10 to August 27, there was a seven week stretch with just one day and only 1 mm of rain, and from July 23 to August 27, there was a 36-day period with no measurable precipitation.  That's a little longer than the typical drought period that Victoria receives each summer, which averages 28 days.

Daily and cumulative rainfall, 2016 vs 30-year average

The chart below compares Victoria's rainfall during summer 2016 with a number of other locations.  Compared with Victoria Gonzales' 42 mm, the Victoria Airport actually received slightly less rain, at 38 mm.  In Vancouver, there was 105 mm at the Airport and 156 mm downtown at the Harbour (so nearly four times as much rain as Victoria).  Up-Island also had more rain than Victoria, with 115 mm at Nanaimo and 95 mm at Comox.  Rainfall in Seattle was closest to Victoria, although there was still nearly twice as much, with 68 mm.  Finally, I have included Toronto's 133 mm.  There was a lot of coverage in the news about the drought affecting Southern Ontario, so this shows that everything's relative: even with one of the worst droughts in memory, Toronto still received more than three times as much rain as Victoria this summer.

Total rainfall, summer 2016

Now lets talk about temperatures.  The mean temperature for June, July, and August at Victoria Gonzales was 16.4 degrees, substantially higher than the 30-year average of 15.6.  In fact, summer 2016 was the 6th warmest in 119 years of record-keeping at Gonzales.  (Last year's summer, at 16.9 degrees, was the warmest on record.)  June's mean temperature of 15.5 degrees was 1.0 degrees above normal, while July's mean of 16.1 degrees was right on normal.  It was August when things really heated up: the mean temperature of 17.5 was 1.2 degrees above normal and just 0.1 degrees below the all time record.  In fact, at the Victoria Airport it was the hottest August on record.

The chart below shows the daily maximum and minimum temperatures at Victoria Gonzales during summer 2016, compared with the 30-year averages.  You can see that there were spikes of above average temperatures in June and again in August, while temperatures in July stayed very close to the average.  The warmest temperature of the summer was 33.1 degrees on August 19.

Daily maximum and minimum temperatures at Victoria Gonzales , summer 2016

A dry and very warm August

August in Victoria was drier and much warmer than normal.

After experiencing very average temperatures in July, Victoria was much warmer in August.  The mean temperature for the month was 17.5 degrees, making it the second warmest August on record at Victoria Gonzales, just a sliver behind the record of 17.6 degrees in 1997.  The Victoria Airport set a new record for the warmest August in 2016, with a mean temperature of 18.3 degrees, beating the old record of 18.1 set in 2004.  Since the beginning of 2014, 29 of the past 32 months have been warmer than the long term average in Victoria.

The chart below compares the daily high and low temperatures with the averages for August.  Temperatures fluctuated between being close to average and being well above average.  The warmest temperature during the month was 33.1 degrees on August 19th.  That was not only a record for the date, but it was the warmest temperature ever recorded at Gonzales for any day after August 15.  Heat waves like that are rarer in the second half of August than they are earlier in the summer.

Daily maximum and minimum temperatures, August 2016

For most of the month, August was very dry, with no measurable rainfall until the 28th.  Victoria then received 7.2 mm during the last four days of the month.  That was still well below the normal of 18.6 mm for the month, but not usually so: in the past 119 years, Victoria Gonzales has had less than 7.2 mm during August 28 times, or about one quarter of the time.

The chart below compares daily and cumulative rainfall in August 2016 with the average cumulative rainfall for August.  You can clearly see how most of the month was very dry and well below the average.

Daily and cumulative rainfall, August 2016

While, on average, Victoria Gonzales is the driest location in the region, this August there was actually less rain at the Airport: 3.2 mm vs. 7.2 mm.  It was generally dry at other nearby locations, though not quite so dry as Victoria.  In Vancouver, there was 13.8 mm at the Airport and 12.5 mm downtown at the Harbour.  Up-Island, there was 20.8 mm at Nanaimo and 26.1 mm at Comox.  In Seattle, there was just 4.3 mm of rain during August.