Temps To Remain Warm, Says NWS

Warmer than normal weather may stick around for the next little while.

That is according to the National Weather Service office in Greenville-Spartanburg.

Temperatures have reached the 90s for the past several days.

That is above normal for this time of the year as normal temperatures are in the upper 80s typically, according to information from the Weather Service.

Meteorologist Jake Wimberly said that the heat is being caused by a high pressure system that has gotten comfortable in the Southeast.

“We are under the influence of a large area of sub-tropical high pressure that is sort of sitting over the southeastern coastal region,” said Wimberly. “It is just the upper flow pattern in the atmosphere is not really conducive to that being pushed out of the way anytime soon.”

According to Wimberly, remnants of Tropical Storm Bill pushing east over the next couple of days could break that high pressure up just a little bit, but not much.

However, he said even that will not be long-lived.

“Towards the early to middle part of next week, we get back under the influence of another area of hot high pressure, so drier than normal conditions would continue and we may see temperatures rise back up to near-record levels once again,” said Wimberly.

Wimberly went on to say that while temperatures are above normal, it is not unheard of to see a hot spell like this in June.

“In 2012, late June and early July, there was an extensive heat wave over much of the eastern U.S., so it is not terribly unusual, but it is above normal,” he said.

Weather service information shows that Toccoa has seen warmer temperatures, with record highs for this time of year reaching triple digits.

Meanwhile, summer officially starts on Sunday.

Wimberly said this hot spell is not necessarily a harbinger of things to come over the next couple of months.

“The 8 to 14-day outlook has a good chance of the southeast remaining above normal as far as temperatures and the 1 to 3-month outlook, there is the slightly better than equal chances of us having a warmer than normal period. But that does not mean we will see temperatures like this continue the rest of the summer. We will still see warmer periods and cooler periods.”

Meanwhile, there is the chance of storms to cool things off.

One such storm moved through Toccoa Thursday, causing at least one tree to fall and dumping almost four-tenths of an inch of rain in a short period of time.