Warm, Sunny and Very Dry
Submitted by Bill Caulfeild-Browne
The mean temperature for October 2024 was 11.7C, or 2.7C above the norm of 9.0C. The warmest day was the 1st when we got a summer-like high of 22.1C. The coldest was the 24th when we flirted with frost at 1.1C. No doubt it was somewhat colder away from the lake.
This wasn’t a record – in 2007 the mercury averaged 12.5C – but it was probably the sunniest October I have recorded. Twenty-two days were sunny pretty much all day and only four were mostly cloudy.
We did set a record for lack of rainfall as precipitation only totalled 23.4mm. Our previous “drought” was in the year 2000 when just 25.8mm fell. Contrast that with last year’s 150mm!
Winds were about normal at 13.3 km/hr with the highest gust measuring 56.3 km/hr. What was unusual, and explains the warmth, is that the predominant direction was southerly.
Tobermory was not alone in this exceptional warmth. Climate Change Canada reports that “Mean monthly temperature was again above normal for most of the province, continuing the mostly warm trend for 11 months now”. Record high departures were recorded on the 21st with many southwestern locations reaching 26-27C. (Big Tub Harbour was 20C that day.) But not everywhere benefitted – Kirkland Lake, on the other side of the warm front, set a record overnight low of -10.6C on the 28th. On the 31st some areas near Sudbury saw almost 2cm. of snow.
Several climate models suggest warmer conditions will prevail for November, though as I write this on the 3rd, the thermometer shows 0.3C! We will have to see if the forecast has any truth to it.
