April brought respite from dry spell

The National Weather Service ingests data everyday from 900 automated stations in the United States. Since we are such a large nation, that's just not enough info for weather forecasting and climate calculation.

NWS is also bolstered by 10,000 volunteer observers in the National Weather Service Cooperative Observer Program. Started in 1890, the program gathers info from farms, urban and suburban areas, National Parks and even seashores and mountaintops. There are observers in every state and U.S. territory from Palau to Puerto Rico. People interested in joining that corps of weather buffs are encouraged to check out https://www.weather.gov/wrn/get-involved to learn more.

Observers around here last month noticed more rain than the long-range forecasters figured. Despite fears of a continued dry spell in April, decent rains fell instead and brought water levels up. As this article is being written on Monday, April 26, we are 0.80 of an inch over normal for rainfall. Temperatures for April continued a warm streak and were 2.4 degrees higher than normal when the stats were calculated on the 25th. Call that a preliminary guess, because things can really change around here between April 25 and 30.

In May, it is reckoned that temperatures will run from one to four degrees higher than normal. Rainfall, though, may go back to the scant side and come up with maybe 2 inches. That's an inch lower than normal.

So, the little side trip the dry conditions took last month may get back on track here in May. The long-range forecast guesstimate calls for sunny and warm conditions May 1-3. May 4-9 should be rainy and cool. May 10-18 may rebound and become sunny and warm. May 19-31should be warm too, and that heat could trigger thunderstorms.

Writer Dave Anderson is a CBS 3 meteorologist and provides the weather forecast on Page 2 each week for the Pine Knot News.