July Hotter and Wetter than Normal

Now that July is coming to an end, the Birmingham climate summary proves this month was above average for both temperatures and rainfall. Compiling the average of our high temperatures, we actually experienced slightly cooler than normal afternoon highs. Meanwhile, the very warm and muggy overnights led to an average low temperature of 73.7°, which is quite a bit above normal. Overall, this allowed for the July temperature average to end up nearly a degree above average.

One of the more impressive statistics was how much rain we totaled for the entire month at a whopping 3.46" above average. July is one of our wetter months due to the amount of moisture streaming off the Gulf of Mexico combined with summer heat to form nearly daily showers and storms. Typically, we average around 5.42" of rain in July, but this year Birmingham ended up with nearly nine inches of rain! This is hard to believe considering the drought conditions that continued to develop through the first three weeks of the month. Up until a week ago, this month was shaping up to deliver well below normal rainfall.

However, the recent stretch of unsettled weather at the end of the month quickly allowed us to compensate for the dry soils with 5.69" of rain falling in just the last eight days. This would have been enough rainfall to cover the entire normal amount for July, let alone in just one week. Breaking down the daily temperatures, it is hard to forget the very hot start to the month with nearly every day above average of where we should be in the lower 90s through July 18th. Of course, coinciding with the rainy end to July was well below average temperatures with some days barely getting out of the 70s due to the persistent clouds and rain. This prolonged period of below normal temperatures lasted ten days, arguably even more impressive than the consistent heat we started July with.