Good news about a hot July: It was worse elsewhere
Average temperature was 5 degrees higher than normal in Groton
If you are thinking that it was an unusually hot July, you are not wrong.
The average high temperature measured at Groton-New London Airport in July was 83.5 degrees, and the average low was 67.8 degrees. The average of those two numbers — 75.6 degrees — is 5.1 degrees above normal, according to Western Connecticut State University meteorologist Gary Lessor.
Comparatively, he said, average July temperatures were above normal by 4.6 degrees in Windsor Locks, 3.7 in Bridgeport and 2.5 in Danbury.
NBC Connecticut meteorologist Ryan Hanrahan reported Monday that the Hartford area was on track to have the warmest July in its 114-year period of maintaining records. He noted that the region saw a record-breaking 18 days with temperatures at or above 90 degrees.
Lessor said southeastern Connecticut saw two days at or above 90 degrees: July 20 and 21. He said each was a record high for that day going back to 1999, when the National Weather Service began tracking temperatures at the Groton airport.
For the heat-averse, there are worse places to be in New England than southeastern Connecticut; Lessor noted the temperature hit 86 degrees here Wednesday but got up to 94 in Boston. WBUR meteorolo
gist David Epstein reported Tuesday that this July was the warmest month ever recorded in Massachusetts’ largest city. Epstein said the nights have been particularly warm, partially because the city is seeing so much building, and building materials radiate heat absorbed during the day.
Lessor attributes the heat to a Bermuda High — which the National Weather Service defines as a “semi-permanent, subtropical area of high pressure in the North Atlantic Ocean” — that has brought warm and increasingly humid conditions throughout July.
“It looks as though at least as we go into the beginning of August, that the extreme is abating,” he said. “We’ll have to see once we get past the first week, if there’s some return.”
He noted that prolonged heat tends to wear itself out, meaning it runs out and then has to build back up again.
For today, Lessor forecasted the weather in southeastern Connecticut to be mostly sunny, 80 to 85 degrees and “humid but not oppressively humid.” He expects the dew point to be in the mid-60s the next few days, lower than it was Wednesday, with a chance of rain on Saturday and Sunday.
While there’s usually an uptick in heat-related illnesses around this time of year, this July hasn’t been any worse than in previous years, said Dr. Cynthia Tucker, assistant director of the emergency department at Lawrence + Memorial Hospital.
She said heat-related illnesses are mostly things like dehydration and syncope, or passing out, but she doesn’t recall severe heat-related illnesses recently. Tucker said L+M had a lot of preparations in place for Sailfest weekend, with cooling stations and additional staffing, but the emergency department “just didn’t see that big of an uptick.”
Her advice for people during extreme heat — especially for at-risk populations like children, the elderly and those with underlying health conditions — is to stay hydrated and remain indoors in an air-conditioned space.
At Berry’s Ice Cream & Candy Bar on Bank Street in New London, manager Simone Barner said there’s been a real influx of business due to the heat and the ships that came in. As long as it’s sunny out, she said, the shop is going to be busy.
It’s also benefitting from a move last year to a larger space, a deck and BYOB allowance.