New York City Weather Archive

Today in New York Weather History: May 16

• 1989 - Just before daybreak 0.58" of rain poured down in one hour, between 5:23-6:23 AM. 

 

• 1990 - 2.32" of rain fell, with much of it after 7PM.  A year earlier on the same date, 2.30" fell.

 

• 2001 - This was the 25th day in a row without precipitation, making it the second longest rainless streak in the 1979-2012 period, passing two streaks of 24 days in Jan/Feb 1980 and August 1995. 

 

• 2007 - I celebrated my 50th birthday two days after the actual date with an evening dinner party at a Venezuelan restaurant in Greenwich Village.  Unlike my 40th birthday, which had beautiful weather, this year featured thunderstorms between 3-9PM that dropped 0.83" of rain.

 

• 2012 - Overnight showers, amounting to 0.09", made this the 7th year out of the past nine in which some rain fell on this date. 

Looking Back at New York Weather: April 10

 

• 1980 - A day after 3.42" of rain fell, today was dry and warm with afternoon temperatures in the low 70's, thirteen degrees above average.  The weather was perfect for the the Mets' home opener against the Cubs.

 

• 1983 - 4.31" of rain fell, with nearly 2.50" of it falling in just three hours (between 11AM-2PM).

 

• 1992 - Although today's Mets home opener was twenty degrees cooler than last season's record heat, at 71 it was still twelve degrees above average.  This was also the first 70-degree day of the year - two weeks later than usual. 

 

• 1996 - An overnight snowfall of 0.7" was the last snow of the season, bringing the winter's total to a hefty, record-breaking 75.6".  This was 48" above the average winter and came just two years after 53.4" fell.

 

• 2010 - Three days after a high of 92, this morning's low was 50 degrees colder. 

 

• 2013 - What had been a beautiful spring day, with a high of 74 degrees, came to a crashing end as a series of strong thunderstorms barreled through between 7-11PM.  What made them especially noteworthy was the fact that they occurred in early April.  However, despite the storm's long duration, relatively little rain fell, with just 0.49" measured in Central Park.  Still, this was the first rainfall of the month.

Today in New York Weather History: March 28

 

• 1984 - A developing nor'easter brought a mix of snow and rain during the afternoon that continued through tomorrow.  1.5" of snow fell today, but forecasts had predicted substantially more.  The temperature in the City was a bit too mild to support a snowstorm (high/low was 43/34).

 

• 1985 - The afternoon temperature topped out at 78, twenty-four degrees warmer than average and more typical for the 2nd week of June (and four degrees warmer than yesterday).  However, this was not a record as there was an even more extraordinary warm spell in 1945. 

 

2005 - My flight back to NYC from Pittsburgh after visiting my mother for Easter took eight hours because of strong thunderstorms in the New York area.  2.98" rain fell, a record for the date.  This was the biggest rain producer in six months, since tropical storm Jeanne dumped 4.66" at the end of September. 

 

• 2012 - Today's high/low of 67/44 was the sixteenth day this month with a daily mean temperature ten degrees or more above average - the most of any month in the 1979-2012 period (passing January 1990's fifteen days).  So far this year, more one-third of the days were ten degrees or more above average.  

Today in New York Weather History: March 18

• 1977 - The last snowfall of the season, measuring 0.6", fell at daybreak before changing to rain.

 

• 1983 - 3.10" of rain fell, most of it coming down between 1-9PM.  This made it NYC's rainiest 24 hours ever in March, but this was later disputed when it was discovered that Central Park's rain gauge had been broken for much of the year.  (On March 13, 2010 a more legitimate daily rainfall record for March was set when 3.88" fell.)  

 

• 1989 - The temperature nosedived 40 degrees, from 77 to 37.  The cold front that ushered in the sharply colder air produced a severe thunderstorm mid-afternoon in which 0.35" of rain poured down in just ten minutes (between 3:14-3:24 PM).  There was also some hail, a rarity in NYC.

 

• 1990 - This was the last day of an extraordinarily mild eight days in which the mean temperature was 18.5 degrees above average (high/low of 71/47).

 

• 1993 - This morning's low of 13 degrees was the coldest reading this month, twenty-three degrees colder than average.  The last time it was this cold in March was in 1984.

 

• 1994 - 2.8" of snow fell during during the afternoon, the last snowfall of the winter.  This brought the season's total snowfall to 53.2", making it the snowiest winter since 1960-61.  The day was a cold one, with a high/low of just 33/25, fourteen degrees below average.      

 

• 2000 - This morning's low of 22 degrees came two days after a high of 65.

 

• 2004 - A mixture of snow, sleet and freezing rain during the morning accumulated just under an inch and was the final ice/snow of the winter.  This was the second winter in a row with more than 40 inches of snow, the first time that's happened since the winters of 1947/48 and 1948/49.

 

• 2011 - Today's record high of 77 degrees was the warmest reading in nearly six months.

 

• 2012 - Morning clouds and fog cleared in the afternoon and the high reached 63.  Although this was thirteen degrees warmer than average, it was one of the coolest readings in the Eastern 2/3 of the country as most areas basked in temperatures between 75 and 85 degrees.    

 

• 2013 - A wintry mix of snow and sleet moved in during the late afternoon, and by midnight three inches had accumulated (the most snow on this date in more than 50 years).  This was significantly more snow than had been forecast as a changeover to rain occurred much later than predicted.  Also, with a high/low of 35/28, this was the coldest day this month - eleven degrees below average.

Today in New York Weather History: December 23

 

• 1989 - The morning low of +6 was the coldest reading of the month and the year, twenty-three degrees below average.  With today's frigid temperatures, 1989 became the year that had the most days with mean temperatures 10 degrees above or below average (based on daily records going back to 1979).

 

• 1990 - It was a record-setting mild day as the high reached 66 after a low of 57 - a staggering 28 degrees above average.  This was quite a change from a year ago.

 

• 1998 - This was the first day since November 22 that had colder than average temperatures, a span of 30 days.  It was also the first day this winter completely below freezing.  Today's high/low of 29/18 was in sharp contrast to the 55/42 averaged in the first three weeks of the month.

 

• 1999 - Somewhat similar to this date last year, today was the twenty-first day in a row with above average temperatures.  Temperatures were 7 degrees above the norm during this 3-week span.

 

• 2004 - A strong cold front blew through during the afternoon, producing thunderstorms with 40-50 mph wind gusts.  These storms caused extensive airport delays.  My flight to Pittsburgh, where I was going to visit my mother for Christmas, was delayed by a day when my flight out of Newark was one of many cancelled.  Today's high of 59 came just three days after a morning low of 11, the month's temperature extremes.   

Today in New York Weather History: October 11

 

• 2002 - An all-day rain dumped 3.06" of rain on the City, a record for the date (and the first time it rained on this date in 10 years).  This was part of a 56-hour "rain-athon" that began the previous night and ended in the wee hours of the 13th.  All told, 4.54" fell. 

 

• 2007 - Today was the 22nd consecutive day with above-average temperatures, the longest such stretch during the autumn in the 1979-2012 period.  During these days temperatures were 9 degrees milder than average.  A cold front moving through during the afternoon triggered storms that dumped nearly an inch-and-a-half of rain, with an inch of it falling in a 2-hour period ending at 5:30 PM. 

 

• 2010 - 1.13" of rain fell today, the 4th time in the past nine years more than an inch of rain fell on this date. 

Today in New York Weather History: September 18

 

• 2004 - 2.18" of rain fell during the morning, most of it between 7-9AM, as the remnants of Hurricane Ivan moved through.  Ivan's rainfall was much heavier in Pennsylvania and upstate New York.  Damage wise, the storm was one of the five costliest hurricanes (until 2010's Hurricane Irene pushed it down to sixth).    

 

• 2012 - A squall line rolled through between 6:30-7:30 PM and dumped 1.54" of rain, with 1.06" of it falling in a 30-minute period. 

Today in New York Weather History: September 16

 

• 1991 - Today's steamy high of 91/low of 72 was 13 degrees above what's typical for mid-September.

 

• 1999 - Tropical storm Floyd flooded the area with 5.02" of rain, forcing many businesses to close early and causing service on some subway lines to be suspended because of track flooding.  Today's rainfall, a record for the date, was an inch more than what fell for the entire summer.  More than half of it fell between 7AM and noon, but an additional 0.76" fell from a final band of heavy rain that moved through between 6-7PM.  Rainfall in Newark and Philadelphia exceeded seven inches.  Floyd produced historic flooding in North Carolina, Virginia, Delaware, eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey and was one of the ten most destructive natural disasters in U.S. history.   

 

• 2010 - A violent and fast-moving storm ripped through the City during evening rush hour.  While Manhattan was largely spared (0.46" of rain fell), parts of Staten Island, Brooklyn and Queens were hit by tornadic winds.  I was meeting a friend for dinner and made it to the subway at West 4th St. just as the storm was approaching.  By the time I arrived in Midtown fifteen minutes later, the worst of it was over.  Not until after we had finished dinner and I walked Nina down to Penn Station, where she was catching her train, did we learn of the severity of the storm.  The Long Island Railroad was shut down and Nina had to stay over at my place until morning.         

 

 

Today in New York Weather History: September 10

 

• 1983 - Wow, a high of 97 in the second week of September - 20 degrees above average!  No surprise, it was a record for the date.

 

• 1989 - A sizzling high of 94.

 

• 1992 - In just five minutes 0.42" of rain fell between 11:15-11:20 AM, and 1.02" fell in the twenty-minute period between 11:06-11:26 AM!

 

• 1996 - Today was the last 80-degree of the year, the earliest date of that occurrence since I moved to NYC in 1979.  The average date for New York's last 80-degree day of the year is September 27 (based on 1979-2012 period).

 

• 1999 - 0.77" of rain fell between midnight and 1AM.  Total rainfall for the day, 1.38", was a record for the date (and one of the lowest totals to be a daily record).

 

• 2001 - It was a warm and sticky day, but then a passing cold front produced thunderstorms in the late afternoon and evening.  The evening thunderstorm dumped 0.57" of rain between 6:15-6:45 PM.  Skies cleared afterward, making for beautiful flying conditions the next day throughout the Northeast.

 

• 2002 - Today's high of 90 was the last, and 32nd, 90-degree day of the year.    

 

 

• 2007 - A couple of showers, amounting to 0.18", broke a streak of nineteen rainless days.

Today in New York Weather History: September 7

 

• 1979 - Today was the 19th day in a row with above-average temperatures - and thirteen of these days had afternoon highs of 85 degrees or warmer.  It was also the 12th consecutive day in which low temperatures were in the 70's - seven of these consecutive days were in September, the longest streak of 70-degree mornings in the 1979-2012 period.

 

• 1998 - It was Labor Day and the afternoon and evening were marred by severe thunderstorms.  0.64" fell between 1-2PM and later 1.61" fell between 9PM-1AM.  This was the rainiest 9/7 on record.