Flirting with 90s by mid-week
This unusually pleasant (for Baltimore) July weather will continue today, with slightly below-normal temperatures, sunny skies and low humidities. But we may be flirting with the 90s again by Wednesday as the cold front that drifted by us over the weekend turns and slides back north as a warm front.
Ninety-degree weather and steamy humidity are what we've all come to expect from living in Baltimore and around the Chesapeake Bay. But somehow, this spring and summer, we've managed to avoid it almost entirely.
Until Sunday afternoon, the only 90-degree days we'd had (officially, at least, at BWI-Marshall) were in April. And those three hot days came before we saw any days with highs in the 80s. Since then - through all of May and June and almost half of July - the hottest we managed was 89 degrees, June 25 and 26.
On Sunday, the airport thermometer did touch 90 degrees, briefly, at 5:10 p.m. But the humidities were low, in the mid-40-percent range, making it much more comfortable if you could get out of the direct sunshine.
By Wednesday and Thursday, however, the forecast calls for temperatures near 90 degrees again, with higher humidities and slight chances for showers and thunderstorms.
Until then, we're enjoying average to slightly below-average temperatures and low humidities in the wake of that cold front, which is now stalled across extreme southern Maryland and southeast Virginia. Tuesday should be sunny and seasonably warm at 87 degrees.
The good news is that this more familiar heat and humidity won't last long. By the weekend, forecast highs drop back into the lower 80s, several degrees below the long-term averages for BWI at this time of year.
What's becoming more apparent, however, is that the wet weather our lawns and gardens enjoyed from April through mid-June appears to have ended. The airport has recorded just eight-tenths of an inch of measurable rain since June 18.
That's not unexpected in mid-summer. But it shows in our lawns. Grass that grew luxuriantly all spring has suddenly turned brown as rain falls short of its needs. Baltimore - start your sprinklers!
