MONTHLY SUMMARY: JUNE 1996 PREPARED: 7-21-96 --------------------------------------------------------------------------- The heat and humidity of summer press on, broken by some heavy thunderstorms, an unusually early hurricane at the coast, and unusual troughs over the East. Hope you're enduring this all quite well. Some of us have seen quite a bit of severe weather. Look forward to your July summaries for details! Here in Portsmouth, most everything is back to normal after Hurricane Bertha's intrusion. Hope everything is back to normal in Paul Bassett's territory after the late June tornado that struck his neighborhood! Hope to include some of your articles and graphs if space permits. (in written copy but not online) --Received this note from John Bullock in Louisa: Thank you for permitting me to be a contributor to your ACON for the past several years. On May 23 I was taken to a Charlottesville hospital for a major cancer operation (re-section of the colon). I was there for 20 days. I am now at home. I am past 87 years old and live alone. I am using nursing services daily. I am unable to walk out into the yard to make any weather readings so I am forced to give up all weather reporting for the immediate future. I hope to be able to resume records by September. Thank you for your cooperation and courtesies. John W. Bullock John, please take it easy and work hard at becoming healthy again! We're sure you can't wait to get back into taking readings, but that'll come with time! With only 87 years of youth on your side, there'll be many bright days ahead, just in time for measuring those winter snows!! At 87+, your efforts and knowledge of Virginia weather are a blessing to our group and to those who read your data monthly online! Hurry and get well! --With the new data reporting form, some confusion arose. Regarding the new "Number of days with dense fog" designation, this applies to days which have a visibility of 5/8ths of a mile or less. Such visibilities usually prompt a dense fog advisory from the NWS offices. You, Lauck Walton, are correct when you note there is no definition in documentation for observations. Had to call the NWS to get a clarification on this. Sort of agreed upon, but not written down! Furthermore, I corrected the form to request "# Days >=1.00" for precipitation instead of the typo asking for <=1.00" Another typo could be found after "Observation Times" at the top of the form. Instead of "Time" the request should be for "Temps" as some of you have different times for recording temps and precip. Next, the "past season's total snowfall" is for the past season which in Virginia runs from fall (1995) through spring (1996), not just for calendar year 1996. For precipitation, there is a difference between daily max and 24-hour period max. From midnight to midnight is the daily max while the 24-hour period is any 24 hour period say from 12 noon to 12 noon, one day to the next. Many weather summaries include this to keep track of excessive rainfall. Will add this to our monthly summaries- along with dense fog notations- beginning with the July 1996 report. --If any of you are coming online, then please forward you e-mail address. --Some of you are members of the International Weather Watchers (IWW). Registration forms are out for the annual meeting in Tampa in November! Dr. Joe Friday, head of the NWS, will be the main speaker! Hope to see ya' there! ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTES FROM "AROUND THE LEAGUE"- Arlington - NWS DCA noted: June 1996 was a consistently warm and humid month with near normal rainfall. A tornado passed through neighboring Fairfax and Prince Georges Counties on the 24th. A thunderstorm which built over Winchester moved east and produced a strong tornado around Centreville with winds up to 150 mph. The tornado tracked east across Fairfax County all the way to the Beltway. Thunderstorm damage was noted thereafter across Alexandria followed by more tornado damage in Prince Georges County. Some residents of Alexandria and Centreville were without power for several days. Miraculously, no fatalities were directly attributed to the storm. Bridgewater - Clayton Towers reports: "There were four consecutive afternoons with downpours from thunderstorms. One of these downpours produced 1.63 inches of rain which caused quite a bit of flooding. The ground was already saturated when this storm started which was a contributing factor in the flooding. There were 15 days with rainfall. The month was the wettest June since 1972. Also, the month was the second wettest in my 32 years of keeping records on precipitation. So far in '96, we've had 18 thunderstorms and we usually get 20-25 a year. The average temp for the month was over 3 degrees above normal. Falls Church - Lowell Koontz reported that the worst of the June 24th thunderstorms passed about 0.6 mile to the south of his station. There, many roofs and trees were damaged. Winds in that area were reported to have reached 75 mph. The month was rather warm and dry and had the clearest skies of any since 1988. The clearest of Junes has followed the cloudiest of Junes, noted in 1995! Fredericksburg - Ken McKneely writes: Temperatures averaged about 2 degrees above normal for all 3 mean categories. Rainfall was a little over « inch above normal. Consistent June temps were noted. With the exception for only one day, the daily highs fell within a 13 degree range. A strong thunderstorm moved through the area around 1800 on the 24th. There were many brilliant cloud-to-ground lightning strikes, strong gusty winds, and torrential rain. At the northern end of this line of storms. tornadoes and hurricane force straight line winds hit the DC area. Fredericksburg - According to Matthew Michaelson, on June 18th a strong thunderstorm dumped 1.31 inches of rain within less than an hour. The storm prompted the issuance of flash flood warnings as torrential rainfall was observed from Doppler radar. Another 0.34 inch fell from residual showers following the thunderstorm. The highest winds gust of the month of 35 mph came from this thunderstorm. Hampton - Dave Kessel noted below normal precip for his station in June. Not that far away, higher totals were noted, which all-in-all is typical for summer. Temps were close to the norm. Newport News - According to Gary Leonard, the 74 mph wind gust of June 24, at 7:17 PM during a severe thunderstorm, was the highest he's ever recorded! There was considerable tree damage in an area approximately 3/4 mile wide by about 2 miles long. Portsmouth - Temps and precip here were just above normal. A series of thunderstorms dropped 1.95" of rain on the 24th and 25th. The monthly precip was spread out rather nicely keeping the lawn and garden watering efforts at a minimum. Seven days had thunderstorms producing 10 different thunderstorm events. Mechanicsville - Glenn Martin noted that strong t-storms moved through the area around 8 PM on the 4th with downpours and sharp lightning. T-storms moved through the area again on the 10th and the 23rd which also produced downpours and sharp lightning. Roanoke - Wendell Prillaman noted that June temps were 1.2 degrees above average while precip was 3.79 inches above the norm. Woodstock - Lauck Walton notes that the thunderstorm of 6/25 dropped 1.73" of rain in about one-half hour. Also, the normal first 6 months of the year rainfall is 15.75" and 1996 has surpassed that by quite a bit! (24.11") Brevard - According to Bob Keehn's records for June which date to 1990, the month was a normal one for temps and rainfall. The month ended on a dry note as the last good rain occurred on the 19th and rain was desperately needed by month's end! (Hope you received it!) Charlotte - NWS at Greensville-Spartanburg SC reported that June 1996 began on a rather stormy note with several systems affecting the area. Some wind damage and large hail noted on the 4th- By mid-month, summer definitely set in as a ridge of high pressure anchored itself over the East Coast. The month warmed nicely and dried-out. Henderson - On July 4th, reports George Stevenson, he and others helped a park ranger carry-out a hurricane awareness demonstration on the beach at Cape Hatteras! Raleigh - Bob Woodson included this on his report form: June was slightly warmer and drier than normal. The biggest weather story was the excessive humidity. A dew point of 79 degrees was recorded on the 24th at this station. At NWS (RDU), weatherpersons reported that the month was quite warm compared to the average June. The thermometer soared to a record high 99 degrees on the 24th. Here too in Raleigh, most precip for June fell in the first half of the month. At the end of the month, gardens and crops were in need of a good watering from Mother Nature! Roxboro - From Merriell Jay come these notes: "June was warmer and drier than normal. Only a brief heatwave during the fourth week was the major excitement. There were the routine summertime scattered thunderstorms." Wilmington - According to NWS ILM, the Port City had an abundance of rain during June (8.02"). Despite this, as of June 30th, the yearly rainfall was still 2" below the norm. Thunder was reported on 13 days, almost twice the average. Tropical Storm Arthur never produced the advertised rain and winds for the Wilmington area as the storm passed just off the coast producing 0.27" of rain and a wind gust to 27 mph. (Editor's note: guess Bertha made-up for that!) Greenville-Spartanburg - NWS GSP noted that June began as if spring would continue to hold sway! Ample rainfall kept lawn groomers quite busy. Storm events produced some severe weather in upstate SC during the first half of the month. Lightning on the 4th caused several building fires and one reported injury. The second half of the month was dry with abundant sunshine. The 97 degree high on the 24th also established a new record high for the date. Ruby - According to Franklin Hancock, June was very hot! The month only had 11 days with highs below 90 degrees. The crops and gardens began to suffer once or twice, but rains arrived just in time to solve the problems! ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- UPDATED MEMBERS' E-MAIL ADDRESSES: (posted by permission) BRE Bob Keehn Bob_Keehn@juno.com BRI Clayton Towers Ctowers@rica.net POR Bill Trotter wtrotter@pen.k12.va.us 71470.1535@compuserve.com wtrotter@whro.org FRD Matthew Michaelson mmichael@s850.mwc.edu RAL Bob Woodson woods@usa.pipeline.com CEN Paul Bassett III pbassett@nmaa.org -----------------------------------------------------------------------------