By Barney Leach
April 2019 produced the wettest April I have recorded in 25 years as a weather volunteer with 11.03 inches of rain. The previous wettest April was 10.33 inches in 2009. We had only seven days with measureable rainfall but 4.18 inches on April 24 filled in for all the days without rain.
Our total rainfall for the year now stands at 18.63 inches. We went from 3.71 inches below normal on rainfall at the end of March to a surplus of 4.02 inches through April. Our normal rainfall through April is 14.61 inches.
Our wettest month over the past 25 years was 14.36 inches of rain in October of 2015.
Temperature-wise, April produced fairly mild temperatures with highs mostly in the 70’s and 80’s. We had a high temperature of 91 degrees on April 9 but highs remained in the 70’s and 80’s for the remainder of the month. Low temperatures were mainly in the 60’s and 70’s with a few in the 50’s. Last year produced the third coolest April on record for our area.
RAINFALL BY MONTH IN INCHES
Month Rainfall Normal Departure
January 3.79 3.62 +0.17
February 2.28 3.36 -1.08
March 1.53 4.33 -2.80
April 11.03 3.30 +7.73
Totals 18.63 14.61 +4.02
Looking ahead to May: May is normally our second wettest month of the year at 4.59 inches of rain. October reigns as number 1 with 5.3 inches. May is also normally our stormiest month of the year.
Normal rainfall values currently used were derived from averages over the twenty-year period from 1997 through 2016.
The above rainfall and temperature data was recorded by Barney Leach, former co-op weather volunteer for the National Weather Service and former weather volunteer for Channel 8 in Dallas, Channel 10 in Waco and radio station KNES in Fairfield.
