Saturday, May 16, 2020

2020 Weather Station contest winners

As if this year wasn't crazy enough already, the winning date for the UW Weather Station Contest was not only the latest date we have seen in the history of the contest, but also the latest first 20°C day in the over 100 years of weather records in the region (the previous record was May 13th, 1919)

The temperature first went above 20°C at 3:15 pm on May 16th.

Out of the 1191 entries, it was Valerie Christie whose guess of 2:15 pm was the closest to the correct time.  While in second place was Mary Grummett.

I have a lot of respect for everyone who chose dates that were much later than any winning date in the past 100 years.

Congratulations to all the winners and thanks to everyone who entered.

And a question, should we allow people to choose dates in June next year?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nobody wants to say it so I'll say it: the climate is changing but somehow not in a way we were led to believe!

Kuhny said...

Even in a warming climate, the variability of weather conditions in this area is so large that it will be easy to have colder than average months, or several colder than average springs for example, over the span of a few years.

Kuhny said...

Note also that the Kitchener-Waterloo weather station had a maximum of 20.6 on 29-March-2020. I think that opening up June would be a good idea. I also won't be surprised if 20.0 C is reached here in late February as well.