More On Record High Temperatures

From the Tucson NWS webpage this morning:

Recap of Mid-February record to near record high temperatures

Strong high pressure that has been over the area since late last week brought near record to record mid-February temperatures to the region through President's Day. Near record to record highs can be expected again on Tuesday. Below is a recap for select locations across southeast Arizona.

Tucson

Number of records set or tied - 3

February 15 - 88°; new record high; old record 85° in 1957

February 16 - 85°; tying daily record previously set in 1994

February 17 - 86°; new record high; old record 83° in 2004

The 88° from the 15th ranks as the 9th warmest February high on record, tied with three other dates.

The airport has recorded 5 straight days with highs of 80° or warmer, which ranks as the 4th longest February streak on record. The record is seven straight days, which first occurred in 1989 and then later tied 1995.

Tuesday forecast - 84°; February 18th record high is 85° from 2004.

If the record high is tied or broken on Tuesday, this would be the longest stretch of consecutive days with daily record highs being broken or tied since there were 7 straight days in November 1999.

---------------------------------------------------------- There is currently a fire weather watch in effect for southeastern Arizona tomorrow (Wednesday, February 19th due to the high temperatures, low RH, and forecast gusty west winds. In the longer term, the global models continue to amplify a ridge at 500 mb along the west coast.                                       The GFS ensemble mean and spaghetti plot for 500 mb above is valid at 5 pm MST on February 24th. The ridge  is forecast to return with a vengeance; however, by 10 days out the models hint at a strong short wave breaking  through the bottom of the ridge. Note that there is surprisingly little spread in the global forecast at seven days  (right panel).