What has made this one of the best Seattle summers?

Many of you have been saying this is the best summer in quite some time. Is it? Let’s review some numbers.

At Sea-Tac Airport, the average high temperatures have been just over three degrees above average for June, July, and thus far, in August. It stopped raining on June 27 and there has only been 0.28 inches of rain since then. In 2012, it stopped raining on July 22 and then did not really do so again until Oct. 12, 51 days with only 0.03 inches of rain.

June through Sept. 2009 was another warm summer, with temperatures running close to two degrees above average. 2009 was the year the all-time record of 103 degrees was set on July 29. 2006 was another year that many people said was the best summer. It too, ran close to two degrees above average for June through September and had a dry streak from mid-June to mid-September. Of interest is that both the summers of 2006 and 2009 had five record high temperatures. This year has had but only one record.

No doubt, this year has been a good, warm summer. With the exception of July, it has not been an exceptionally dry summer, especially in contrast to last year. What makes this year stand out, when compared to the previous three years, was that June was drier and had more sunshine than those three soggy years. So summer got off to a quicker start, a couple of weeks later than in 2006.

Nevertheless, we hope you have enjoyed this summer; it has been a good one!