Again

With the rainfall yesterday Allentown passed the five inch mark and for good measure decided to pass the six inch mark too.  There is another three hours left to see how much more can be added to the monthly total.

I arrived home about 30 minutes ago from the Reading area.  When I left it was warm and sunny as it has been most of the day in that part of the state.  The northern and especially eastern parts of the area have been bouncing back and forth between scattered showers.  It's been one of those months.  Tonight was more of the same.  The closer I got to Allentown the darker the sky became.  It started as large building clouds from a distance.  Then a steady rain started.  You wouldn't have guessed I started my drive with sunny and blue skies.

This same cell has been sitting over us for 20 minutes barely moving.  Most of the rain is missing the airport so it is unlikely this data will be collected.  Might at least make for an interesting night as more storms begin to take shape.  Updates to follow.

UPDATE 1:  40 Minutes have passed since that radar image above was captured.  Here is what it looks like now.  Very little movement.

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More Rain

Finished my last post and as I sat here...

Look who has an advisory.

Same areas keep getting the rain.  Their average is higher.  Has to be some reason.

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Misses to Hits

I previously talked about the lack of rain in some areas.  Today will not be one of those days as heavy amounts of rain should fall for most.  I hadn't taken notice of the difference until I went running this week.  My area is quite green.  To the point that everything would appear normal.  Travel south and it's a different story.  Grass looks more like hay that seems ready to burst into flames.

As of Friday Allentown has received over one and a half more inches of rain than Reading and will pass the five inch mark by the end of today.  Also of note July is on average the rainiest month for Allentown at almost five inches while for Reading it doesn't make the top three.  And for more useless information, Philadelphia receives less rainfall than Reading who receives less rainfall than Allentown in a typical year.

It's been a little while since I last asked the question about days over 95 or below 9.  Wouldn't you know we happened to have four straight days over 95 last week.  Now here is the answer for the past three years.  If you take anything out of this realize that in our area summer is pretty short and really not that bad.

Since 2014
Days Over 95 =  6
Days Below 9 = 50


Keeping with the rain theme, I had experienced very few instances this year where I ran in the rain.  In fact it was basically zero. Last night I decided to run to the Steel Stacks which I had yet to do this year.  There was a little blip on the radar which was headed in the direction of town.  I did my normal loop (and stopped at the running store).  Less than two minutes after I arrived the rain hit.  And it came down hard.  Many people went scrambling for cover.  I was hot so I stood on the lawn with more than a few others attendees.  I really enjoy a good rain.  It kept up for a good 20 minutes before slowly moving away.  As I left before it got dark it started up again when I got to the bridge.  I was thrilled and let out some woo's on the bridge.  Nothing like a good rain run.

I've failed to mention that over the past few days, and quite quickly I should add, tent city has emerged on the festside of town.  I'm not going to say the weather is going to be perfect for the 10 day stretch, but it is looking darn good.  No serious stretches of heat with temperatures right at average.  Garden variety shower or afternoon storm is possible, but that's about it.  Once again it looks like the festival will get great weather which is always a concern in early August.

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A Nice Day To Run

Once again another instance of one area getting bad storms with heavy rain while others completely missed out.  Storms rolled through Allentown this afternoon with strong winds, heavy rain and small hail.  I didn't notice.  Mainly because it didn't do anything where I was at as illustrated by these estimated storm totals from ABC Philadelphia.

 

A second bout of rain came through later in the afternoon while the sun was completely out.  I did my best to capture some images and of course look for a picturesque rainbow.  I'd go on, but I have a bed time.

You can see the rain drops on this one.

Now to the other story.

A few weeks ago I noticed a race coming up that takes place at the zoo.  It's basically the same course I use when I want to get in a trail run.  Not very technical (in my opinion) but challenging nonetheless with various elevation changes over a relatively small amount of miles.  Normally I would have been in but I thought better of it.  I already signed up for a 15k the week after and didn't want to do two trails back to back.  So I mentioned the race to a co-worker and said I would not be taking part.

Fast forward to Friday.  I figured I would get in a run on Saturday and then play my hockey game on Sunday.  Nothing too hard on the legs so I would be ready to go for the following weekend.  Towards the end of the day the same co-worker who I told I would not be doing the race at the zoo asked me if I was doing it.  I told him we already had this conversation.  I wanted to save my legs for the other race.  Then I thought, why not do it.  In the span of about 10 seconds I went from not thinking about it to strongly considering showing up.  After all I clearly did not sign up which would mean I would have to register the day of, something I never do. 

I decided not to run Saturday which was the slow build up to what I had already started to plan for.  I was going to the zoo run.  I had just the right amount of beer Saturday night before the 5 am wake up call on Sunday.  When I woke up I felt good.  The run was a go.

I wasn't racing though I probably started too far back.  I've run there many times before so I know what to expect.  I saved energy for the hills and only walked near the end on the steepest sections.  I also considered I was probably one of the few who had a hockey game to get to later and going all out wasn't necessary.  I still easily beat my quickest time.  Not only that I wasn't tired at the end and my legs felt fine.

The disclaimer on the site says the average runner will finish between 1 1/2 and 2 hours.  I finished in 1 hour and 29 minutes.  And that's how you go from not having any interest in doing the race to doing one of the harder trail races in the area.

       

  This guy agrees.

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Where The Rain Be At?

If you haven't noticed it's summer and with little tropical activity of late we have officially hit sporadic thundershower season.  Some places have seen a decent amount of rain while others have seen very little.  It's a big game of hit or miss and some of the hits are proving damaging.

Not often on a sunny day do you get alerts about tornadoes.  Somehow I am still on a list to receive warnings for certain counties when advisories are issued from the weather service.  Sure enough up pops the tornado warning for Northampton county.  Warnings are not good.  That's a clear indication something is happening as opposed to something might happen.  Now the county isn't very big, but it is somewhat long or at least longer than you might think as it extends to the Delaware Water Gap.  I knew it was unlikely Bethlehem was in danger.  Yet where I was at work there was absolutely nothing.  By the looks of it some communities across the border in New Jersey did in fact deal with a relatively weak and short-lived tornado.  This has not been confirmed simply my opinion.

If you were around Saturday you would have seen quite a storm line form and head towards the Lehigh Valley and Poconos.  The perk of being elevated and facing west really comes in handy when storms approach.  This was true again.

The bright portion of the picture below the dark clouds is a shield of water.  Here are a few more as it got closer and during.

Visibility clearly took a hit.  Oddly enough the storm did not have much lightning though when you are above the trees it can be a little weird sometimes.  It also passed through quickly allowing the sun to return.  But if you were 30 miles to the south you would have never known a line passed close by.


It goes to show that without tropical moisture we rely on the thunderstorm for our summer precipitation.  So far we aren't in a horrible position.  Get back to me next week though and I'll post this map again.  To be clear the yellow on the map is the first shade in the drought monitor so our area is under the abnormally dry condition.  Parts of central and northern New Jersey are beginning to experience a drought.

It's not too hard to understand why.  Less than two inches of rain was reported in Allentown in March, April and June.  July has been hotter than normal and that pattern looks to continue throughout the rest of the month


TRIVIA ANSWER:  The only date that has seen snow each of the past three years is February 9th.


Guess Again:  Our average highest daily temperature is 84 and our coldest average daily temperature is 19.  A basic understanding of math would suggest that we see temperatures both above and below these figures.  So what would be considered abnormal?  I don't know, but I went with a higher or colder than average temperature of 10 degrees (about) or 95 or hotter in summer and 9 or colder in winter.  Which leads to the question ---

Since 2014 how many times have we hit at least 95 degrees and how many times have we gone below 9?   

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Take A Guess

I'm slowly working my way back on this site.  The line of storms yesterday helped me revitalize my passion for the weather since we have not seen much in the way of rain lately.  Now I have not kept weather statistics nearly as well as I have kept hockey statistics.  -- Check us out on Elite Prospects.  But I have quietly monitored the past three years too closely.  So, in the spirit of winter which I trust is soon approaching can anyone take a guess on the following question.

In the past three years (don't look it up) name the only date we (Allentown airport) have seen measurable snowfall every year.  Or in basic terms, there has been one day in the past three winter seasons which it has snowed every day.

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