Berks County October weather wrap
Some records stand for a long time, but eventually they fall.
Such was the case of the driest month on record at an official Berks County site in a database that begins with 1869, more than 1,800 months ago.
October's total of 0.03 inch of precipitation eclipsed 0.04 from a century ago, October 1924, by the slimmest of margins in a battle of the most arid months on record.
That 0.03 inch on the automated equipment at Reading Regional Airport, the official National Weather Service site in Berks, came in three widely separate days of 0.01 each.
Jeffrey R. Stoudt, a retired meteorologist and founder of the Berks Area Rainfall Networks, said that of the dozens of other privately run sites in Berks, nearly all were under a tenth of an inch.
"A small minority, mainly north-central Berks, did have slightly over 0.10′′ total, the greatest 0.17 at Mohrsville," he added.
On Friday morning, clouds rolled in ahead of a cold front, with some spots seeing enough rain to wet the ground. However, at the airport only a trace was registered.
Four airports in the region saw zero precipitation for last month, all unprecedented: Philadelphia; Trenton, N.J.; and Wilmington and Georgetown in Delaware. Of the nine airports in the region overseen by the weather service office in Mount Holly, N.J., — which includes Reading Regional — the highest total for the month was 0.18 inch at Mount Pocono.
Drought warning
The dry conditions didn't start with the turn of the calendar, however; they began Aug. 20.
And that month ran through its end with goose eggs for daily totals at Reading Regional. September saw 1.08 inches at the airport, one of the higher amounts in the Mount Holly coverage area.
Combined with October, it all adds up to a drought warning being issued for Berks on Friday by the state Department of Environmental Protection . Schuylkill County is also included in the warning.
A drought watch was issued for all the other counties in southeast, much of the southcentral, parts of the northeast and a large section of southwest Pennsylvania.
In the warning area, residents are asked to voluntarily reduce water use by 10% to 15%, and in the watch area by 5% to 10%.
There are chances of rain on the horizon for Wednesday and Thursday with the possibility of precipitation at 30% each day.
Alex Staarmann, a meteorologist at the Mount Holly office, said he's seen this scenario before: A week out, there seems to be a possibility of rain but as the day approaches the probability dries up.
AccuWeather doesn't foresee any significant rain through the first half of November for Berks.
Historical perspective
The current 60-day total of 1.11 inches of precipitation at an official site in Berks isn't the lowest for a 60-day period.
That measurement is 0.91 inch from Nov. 20, 1955, to Jan. 18, 1956; and Sept. 26 to Nov. 24, 2001, according to Staarman.
During the dry spell since Aug. 20, rain has been recorded often enough that 17 days in a row is the longest stretch without measurable precipitation at Reading Regional.
The all-time longest string of days without measurable precipitation is 34 from Oct. 9, 1924 to Nov. 11, 1924. The entire 0.04 from the prior record holder, October 1924, fell on one day.
The current weather situation in Berks sounds bad enough, but it's worse not far away.
The extreme dryness has been generally confined to a 50-to-70-mile radius of Philadelphia. Georgetown has been the driest at 0.29 inch since Sept. 1, with Wilmington not much better at 0.33.
However, those two Delaware sites did have significant rainfalls late in August.
Philadelphia International has recorded 0.77 since Sept. 1. That total isn't a 60-day record. That belongs to 0.33 inch from May 4 to July 2, 1964. Philadelphia didn't get in on the rains in Delaware.
In Philadelphia, the airport has gone through 35 straight days of goose eggs, leaving the prior record of 29 days from another arid period in 1874 well in the rearview mirror.
Odds and ends
Stoudt said, "Remember previous driest was exactly 100 years ago. And the other very dry midautumn was 150 years ago? What about 50 years ago, 1974?
"Well it was near average, so nothing magic about every 50 years."
Then there is the matter of timing.
"Remember October 1924 began immediately after a drenching on Sept. 29-30," Stoudt added. "October 1924 would not even been in the driest 10 if that wet weather system was only several hours slower in ending."
No such luck in 2024. This is a long-term dry out.
About that exactly 100 years between Octobers, Staarman said: "It's a pretty interesting coincidence."
Stoudt crunched the numbers on the October average temperature of 58.5 degrees.
"Though 3.3 degrees above normal, it's still well short of 10 warmest (Octobers)," he said. "Average of daily lows of 45.0 is near normal while average of daily highs of 72.1 was much above normal but significantly short of greatest highs average of 74.3 from 1947. The majority of sunny days and clear nights with little wind allowed for substantial cooling most nights then strong rebounds by day. Weather was excellent for tourism, recreation and many outside chores."
Only one date record was set last month, and that was the final day, Halloween, when the mercury reached 84 degrees at the airport, topping the prior mark of 81 from 1946 in the mild midcentury.
The forecast shows a surge of warmth coming up on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the temperature possibly reaching 80 degrees both days. The date records for the 5th and 6th are 79 and 77 degrees, respectively. The last 80 in a year is Nov. 2, when an 82 was recorded first in 1950 and again in 1982.
Another long-standing record involving months or years fell in 2018. That record was the highest precipitation total for a year, with 2018 topping 1889 by about 2 inches, toppling a 129-year standard.
Stoudt noted that winters following the bone-dry autumns in 1874 and 1924 were very snowy.
