A Beautiful Autumn

By Russell Russ

Autumn treated us well this year. After a wet start it turned quite warm, then transitioned into a two-week stretch of nice fall weather. There were three, maybe four or five, scattered frosts in the area this month, but none were observed at the weather station. The growing season went relatively unscathed throughout the month. The fall colors were nice as usual, though maybe not the best ever, and arguably they started just a bit sooner than in recent years. It was hard to complain about the weather this month.

The month’s high temperature of 89 degrees was observed on September 11. The low temperature of 37 degrees was observed on September 17. The average mean temperature was 57.9 degrees, about one degree cooler than normal and about two degrees cooler than last September. The 89 degrees on September 11 tied the 1983 record for that date.

The total precipitation for the month was 4.27 inches, 0.45 inches below normal. Most of the month’s rainfall came on just four days, leaving the rest of the month relatively dry. There were four thunderstorms observed this month, with two on the same day. The one that came through during the early morning hours of September 1 was particularly powerful with vivid lighting and numerous cloud-to-ground strikes. Unlike in some recent years, we had no big late-in-the-month rain or wind events to prematurely strip off the highly prized fall foliage.

Through September this year, the total yearly precipitation was 45.10 inches. This is 5.75 inches above normal through the month of September. No snowfall to report on this month, which is normal for us, but stay tuned over the coming months, as many preliminary reports suggest it might be a cold and snowy winter.

Weather observations are recorded by the Great Mountain Forest Corporation at Norfolk’s National Weather Service Cooperative Weather Observer Station, Norfolk 2 SW.