Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Weather columnist Kevin Myatt: Tuesday's low temperature was a year away from being in record books
Kevin Myatt is The Roanoke Times' weather columnist.
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A year ago, Tuesday's morning low of 54 in Roanoke would have been considered a new record low for Aug. 12, eclipsing the previous record of 55 set in 1963.
But since then, the record book has changed.
ThreadEx, a national project to expand the historical time frame for temperature records in many cities across the nation, extended Roanoke's period of record for daily extremes all the way back to 1912. Previously, it only went back to mid-1947, based solely on Roanoke airport data.
Because of that, the reigning record low for Aug. 12 is 51, set in 1930.
Last August, Roanoke set what was then an all-time record for warmest low temperature when it fell to only 79 on Aug. 9. But the research of records from 1912 to 1947 at various sites in Roanoke turned up three dates in the 1930s when the low failed to get below 80. So much for the all-time record.
Overall, though, the hot August of 2007 still holds up well in the deepened record book.
Five of six daily record-high temperatures set last August, based on Roanoke airport data dating to 1947, remain in place with the records extended back to 1912. Six of seven daily records for warmest low temperature set in 2007 are also still standing.
I wrote a column in April explaining the ThreadEx research in more detail. You can still find that on the Web at www.roanoke.com/weather/wb/156966.
