June 2009 In Review: Drier Than Normal

By Frank Macek

CLEVELAND - June 2009 will go down in the books as a rather stormy start to summer.

Despite a northern jetstream that was further south than normal during part of June, the final look at the month showed our temperatures ranged from an average high of 77.2 degrees to an average low of 58.9 degrees

This was a half degree above the 30 year normal for the Greater Cleveland area.

Our highest temperature occurred on June 25th when the mercury sizzled to 92 degrees at Cleveland Hopkins. The morning of June 4th started the chilliest at 42 degrees.

In the rain gauge, the area wound up drier than normal this year as some drought warning signs begin to emerge. Abnormally dry conditions stretched from just southeast of Cleveland, through the center of the state to near Cincinnati.

We finished the month at 2.68 inches of rain, or 1.21 inches below normal. Since January, we are about 1.67 inches of rain drier than usual.

Severe weather occured mainly south of Cleveland on June 17th where a tornado touched down near Smithville in Wayne County, though Cleveland saw almost an inch of rain. And storms revisited the same areas on June 19th, again with heavy rainfall of .44 inches on the date.

The Cleveland area itself saw severe weather on June 25th with winds gusting to 62 m.p.h. at the airport. These storms brought down many branches, some trees and power lines across the area.

June ended with flash flooding mainly east of the city of Cleveland where some areas away from the city reporting two to as much as 3.5 inches of rainfall over a 24 hour period on June 30th.

To view the complete climate summary for the Cleveland area for June: CLICK HERE