Death Valley
July 30th, 2009 at 11:24 am by Bill Steffen under Bill's Blog, Weather
<–Badwater Basin, the lowest spot in North America, 282 feet below sea level. In the summer months Death Valley, California is the hottest place in North America. With the mean upper-level ridge over the Western U.S., this month has been unusually hot. The average temperature for the month has been 104.7° (that’s an average of all the high and low temperatures) and that is 4.2 warmer than average. Temperatures have stayed above 90° at night each of the past seven nights. The high temperatures this month have been between 115° and 128°. Thirty-one of the last 32 days have brought above normal temperatures. The average yearly rainfall at Badwater Basin is about two inches and they haven’t had any measurable rain since Feb. 16. In 1929 no measurable rain fell at Death Valley and there was a 40-month stretch from 1931-34 when only 0.64″ of rain was recorded. The hottest temperature ever was 134° back on July 10, 1934 and in 1917 they recorded 43 consecutive days with high temperatures above 120° and 52 total days above 120° for the season. For anyone really into self-torture, the Ultramarathon run in mid-July is a 135-mile NON-STOP run that starts in the heat at Badwater Basin and goes up 13,000 feet of total vertical climb to end on Mt. Whitney. And there is NO PRIZE MONEY (the winner gets a belt). The record for the 135-miles is 22 hours, 51 minutes and 29 seconds.
LOL No thanks Bill, that run is a deathwish. BTW that’s just a dry heat.
It’s actually a belt buckle and it’s very highly coveted.
Bill:
I don’t remember if I had read this in an earlier blog.
With this cool weather blanketing our state are we in a La Nina cycle, will this have an effect on our winter snowfall amounts and temperatures?
Maggie: I asked Bill that a while back. He said the two years that closest match this year resulted in one year with 2 feet of snow in early November and the other had like 45 straight days of below freezing temps? I can’t find the email, but seems like one year was in the 1950’s and the other was in the 1970’s. Wish I could find the email.
Either way sounded like we have the potential for a cold winter.
Hope this helps. John
how
thats just not right