AUGUST 2001 Wx REVIEW
Note loss of data for first two weeks of the month.
Unless otherwise noted, weather for August was F&LCN&M with not even a hint of tropical moisture. Wet fogs prevailed, with no significant warm spell all month. As for the flora/fauna/enviornment scene, ..widespread blazes throught the West and Northwest, with major fires in Washington, Oregon, California and Montana...but read into this the lack of summer rains over the mountains and darn near critical dryness over the last 2yrs in the Northwest. Local tree growth, shrubbery/etc however has remained green and strong so far , mainly due from normal rains for the year here locally. I forget if I mentioned it, but rainyear 2000-2001 (July1-June30) had San Francisco precip totals in a narrow normal zone with much below rains to the north and much above average rains in the southland. But isn't that typical of strong El Nino patterns you ask? Indeed it is. However the last two year's Central Pacific coastal SST's have been consistently near to slightly below normal (La Nina evolving into La Nada into the current El micro-Nino), likely a result of cold air continuing to plunge N-S off the coast and a strong Japan Cuurrent running straight down the coast. The pattern became so pronounced that...surprise in August, it's getting really chilly! Santa Rosa had a low of 45F on the 19th!!!. In Pacifica, I've noted 2 other sub-50F low readings as well in the last 2 weeks. What's interesting is that these temps are well BELOW SST temps. Usually with summer onshore flow our nightime temps are within 1-2degrees of the local SST,. It takes an unusual set of circumstances (plunging upper level lows) to drive surface cold air this far south. Freezing levels were below 10,000' up north in Washington and snow fell over the higher mountains farther south. Unfortunately, the rain/snow did little to quench the bigger forest fires still raging since last month. An X-Class solar flare + CME happened on the 25th. Only minor aurora and solar wind shock, however. SST's remained constant in the mid-upper 50's most everywhere, with 60F+ retreating to > 25 miles offshore.
MONTHLY CLIMATOLOGICAL SUMMARY for AUG. 2001
NAME: HOME CITY: Pacifica STATE: Ca ELEV: 540' LAT: 37.36'N LONG: 122.27'W
TEMPERATURE (°F), RAIN (in), WIND SPEED (mph)
HEAT COOL AVG
MEAN DEG DEG WIND DOM
DAY TEMP HIGH TIME LOW TIME DAYS DAYS RAIN SPEED HIGH TIME DIR
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14 57.4 63.8 2:30p 54.7 12:00m 5.8 0.0 0.00 2.9 13.0 9:00a SSW
15 55.4 58.5 2:00p 53.8 5:30a 8.8 0.0 0.01 3.3 12.0 2:00p SSW
16 59.9 70.8 12:00p 52.1 11:30p 3.5 0.0 0.00 1.9 10.0 12:00p SSW
17 59.2 71.9 9:00a 50.3 5:30a 3.9 0.0 0.01 2.1 12.0 4:00p S
18 60.5 70.5 9:00a 52.6 6:00a 3.5 0.0 0.00 2.4 14.0 4:00p WNW
19 56.3 63.4 12:00p 50.9 5:30a 7.8 0.0 0.00 2.6 16.0 8:30p NNE
20 55.4 57.3 6:00p 53.3 6:30a 9.7 0.0 0.00 5.7 24.0 8:00p SSW
21 57.4 63.3 1:30p 52.8 7:30a 7.0 0.0 0.00 5.7 20.0 1:30p S
22 61.9 69.4 3:30p 57.4 2:30a 1.6 0.0 0.02 3.7 17.0 1:00p SSW
23 65.5 74.9 9:00a 59.9 4:30a 0.0 2.4 0.00 2.3 11.0 2:00p SSW
24 58.9 65.4 4:00p 54.4 12:00m 5.1 0.0 0.00 2.5 12.0 5:30p SSW
25 59.8 69.0 9:30a 51.9 5:30a 4.5 0.0 0.01 2.5 14.0 3:00p S
26 59.9 70.6 12:30p 54.1 12:00m 2.7 0.0 0.00 2.6 12.0 5:00p SSW
27 60.7 71.1 11:30a 51.5 3:30a 3.7 0.0 0.00 2.0 12.0 4:00p S
28 59.9 69.8 9:30a 51.9 4:00a 4.1 0.0 0.00 3.1 20.0 5:30p S
29 58.8 67.5 12:00p 54.1 6:30a 4.2 0.0 0.00 6.5 28.0 1:00p S
30 58.3 64.3 2:30p 54.6 8:00a 5.5 0.0 0.00 4.9 25.0 1:30p S
31 60.2 75.7 2:00p 51.5 6:00a 1.4 0.0 0.00 2.0 12.0 3:00p SSW
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59.2 75.7 31 50.3 17 82.9 2.4 0.05 1.9 28.0 29 SSW
Max >= 90.0: 0
Max <= 32.0: 0
Min <= 32.0: 0
Min <= 0.0: 0
Max Rain: 0.02 ON 8/22/01
Days of Rain: 1 (>.01 in) 0 (>.1 in) 0 (>1 in)
Heat Base: 65.0 Cool Base: 65.0 Method: (High + Low) / 2