'Too soon' to know if we are entering heat wave

Published On:Wednesday, June 15, 2011

AS temperatures in New Providence peaked at 91° F yesterday for the first time this month, MET officials said it's too soon to know if we are in the beginning stages of a heat wave.

Yesterday's temperature - two degrees above average for June - would have climb another two degrees and continue at that level for a

sustained period to be considered truly

abnormal.

Basil Dean, chief meteorologist, said: "This is the first day that we've experienced it, so we can't call it just yet. It's slightly above the normal average, but you do get those spikes throughout the month.

Summer

"Once you start getting into a stretch of a week and beyond, then for us that could be classified as a heat wave. The summer has not officially started yet, but from an historical point of view, it is normal to get 90 during this month."

Heat waves are classified as five or more consecutive days where the temperature exceeds the average of any month by five degrees.

The mean maximum temperature - a projection which considers meteorological records over the past 30 years - for the month of June is 89 degrees.

However, the maximum temperatures for June have been in the 90s since 1980, according to Mr Dean, with temperatures peaking at 95 degrees in June 2008 and 95.4 degrees in June 2010.

Humidity also contributed to the intense heat experienced yesterday, according to Mr Dean, who said another factor was humans' ability to adapt to changes in the climate.

He said: "What would have made it feel a lot hotter today would be the relative humidity. Southwest winds are bringing a lot of moist tropical air across the Bahamas.

"We go through these cycles every year, cool season and back into the hot season. It appears that we get so comfortable with the cool weather, when those 90s hit you, you soon forget it was only recently very cool.

"One way to judge it is to ask yourself, has there been any record-breaking temperatures? If not, then it's the same heat you would have experienced last year."

The hottest temperature ever recorded for New Providence, 97.7 degrees, occurred during the month of June in 1998.
Source:http://www.tribune242.com/news/06152011_at-heatwave_news_pg5