COLORADO SPRINGS — “The typical hot day for let’s say Colorado Springs in September would be upper 80s. That’s a hot one—no— we’re forecasting this week mid 90’s,” said News 5 Meteorologist, Sam Schreier.
Colorado is experiencing record setting heat in September. Temperatures in the range of 100 are considered high in July, but just weeks before fall they are highly unusual.
One year of record heat is a point of interest, only this is not a single year event. “It’s four years in a row now that we’ve had a big heatwave in September in eastern Colorado.” It is an issue Colorado’s state climatologist, Russ Schumacher is tracking
Schumacher’s main focus is Colorado’s climate, but he is seeing news-making heat across the west. “Definitely records for September in a lot of places and in some places like Sacramento for example set their all time record temperature yesterday.”
He explained what is causing the heat this September. It is a combination of a current high pressure system layered on top of the warming trend that has been happening over several years. There is a third factor with a La Nina weather pattern causing drier air heading into fall.
The three current factors do not fully explain this year after year occurrence of hot temperatures in September.
“In Colorado Springs seven of the eight hottest September days have been since 2017,” said Schumacher, “So it seems the summer is not stopping in mid or late August like maybe it did in the past.”
The September heat pattern impacts things like drought conditions and wildfire danger.
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