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For the record, Denver bakes its way to heat mark

By Bill Scanlon, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published July 30, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.
Updated July 30, 2008 at 5:58 a.m.

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On another day when the mercury topped 90 degrees, Stephanie Schroeder takes her nephew, Colin Taylor, for a stroll around Sloan's Lake on Tuesday morning.

Photo by Ken Papaleo / The Rocky

On another day when the mercury topped 90 degrees, Stephanie Schroeder takes her nephew, Colin Taylor, for a stroll around Sloan's Lake on Tuesday morning.

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Wheat is withering, hungry cattle are being sold to Kansas, and lawns and fields are browning as Colorado endures record heat and dry conditions that may be the continuation of a 10-year pattern.

Denver is on pace to have its driest year in history, as a third consecutive La Nina weather cycle weakens storms headed for Colorado.

And the end isn't in sight.

After Tuesday's high of 93 degrees, and the rest of the forecast not changing much, it looks as if metro Denver will set a record Thursday for the 19th consecutive day in which the temperature reaches at least 90.

If those 90s in the forecast come to fruition, Denver will reach at least 23 days in a row of 90-plus- degree highs, obliterating the record of 18 days set in 1874 and tied in 1901.

Another record might be broken, too: Denver has had its driest January through June in the 135 years that records have been kept, and July hasn't changed anything.

So far, Denver has had just 3.28 inches of precipitation in 2008. During a normal year, a bit more than 10 inches of precipitation has been recorded by late July, on the way to an average precipitation year of 15.8 inches.

The driest year in Denver's history was the drought year of 2002 when just 7.48 inches of precipitation was recorded.

Meteorologists say Colorado hasn't really recovered from the drought that began in 1999 and reached its peak in 2002, despite a few near-normal years and last winter's good snowpack.

"People need to be cognizant that a drought of this type can last much longer than a decade," much longer, in fact, than the iconic Dust Bowl drought of the 1930s, Marty Hoerling, meteorologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Boulder, said Tuesday.

If the drought that started in Colorado in 1999 shows no sign of abating, neither does the shorter-term pattern that has had humans, as well as dogs, panting for relief the past 45 days.

A big high pressure area is stuck above the Front Range, blocking northerly storms from breaking through and southwest monsoons from bringing thunderstorms, Klaus Weickmann, of NOAA, said Wednesday.

Not only are the westerly flows too weak to move it out, but the southerly flows can't budge it.

Instead, the system generates downslope winds from the mountains, "which aren't good for precipitation," Weickmann said.

"When is the thing going to break down? It doesn't look good for the next week or two weeks."

La Nina refers to a weather cycle that starts in the eastern Pacific Ocean and is characterized by colder-than-normal water along the equator - the opposite of an El Nino.

The cold equatorial waters associated with La Ninas tend to push the westerly storms farther north, so Colorado doesn't get very many, Hoerling said.

The storms that do come our way during La Nina years tend to dump snow in the mountains, but have nothing left by the time they cross the Continental Divide.

"We've had more than our share of La Ninas" the past several years that have exacerbated the dryness on Colorado's eastern prairies, Hoerling said. "We've had three years of consecutive La Ninas. Our last big El Nino was in 1998."

While most of the areas of the globe have seen warming the past couple decades, scientists aren't sure why the western U.S. is warming faster than the eastern U.S., Hoerling said.

And they don't know why the 2-degree Fahrenheit average temperature climb the past three decades shows up more in the spring and summer than in the winter and fall.

Colorado needs an El Nino, Weickmann and Hoerling said.

"The thing I'm worried about is that we could stay in La Nina, and this pattern could last for a while," Weickmann said.

scanlon@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2897 Staff writer Carrie Porter contributed to this report

Dry times

Colorado counties seeking federal drought disaster designation:

Adams Arapahoe

Baca Bent

Crowley Cheyenne

Douglas El Paso

Elbert Huerfano

Kiowa Kit Carson

Las Animas Logan

Otero Park

Prowers Pueblo

Teller Washington

Counties seeking disaster designation because of late-spring freezes that damaged crops and forage:

Delta Fremont

Pueblo

Keeping your cool

Here are some unusual tips that you might find useful against the heat:

* Drinking hot tea in hot weather is an age-old trick in the Middle East. While it may burn going down, tea enthusiasts insist the hot temperature has a cooling effect on your body.

* Kick off your shoes and rest awhile. The soles of your feet release a good portion of your body heat.

* Fill up the cooler and take a trip to Rocky Mountain National Park for the weekend. Drive up Trail Ridge Road, the highest paved, continuous road in the nation, and you might even find snow.

* Try the "cooling breath" technique of inhaling with your tongue rolled. It's called shitali pranayama.

* Try flavoring your water with cucumbers or steep water in rose petals, another common practice in the Middle East.

Comments

  • July 30, 2008

    12:42 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    happymike44 writes:

    What never fails to amaze me is Denver has all that gray water from homes showers and tubs.
    If you want to water the lawn just pipe the water into a system in buried under your lawn and into your planters.
    This system could work it would not use up fresh water.
    This would leave more fresh water to be used by the farmers and ranchers.
    Just a thought.

  • July 30, 2008

    6:46 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    farsidefan writes:

    Happy,
    I agree. In the late 70's I hooked up my washing machine to the outdoor hose that had an old fashioned bug eye sprinkler on it.
    The yard was downhill from the washer and it worked quite well.
    I have heard that it is illegal because I was using the water twice. Water law is complicated. The legislature initiated a bill to allow some homeowners to collect rainwater instead of letting it run off their roofs into the ground. Before this bill it was illegal.
    Of course, no one would prosecute, but when it comes to water, who knows.

  • July 30, 2008

    6:48 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    farsidefan writes:

    Sasquatch,
    How is it looking out your window ?

  • July 30, 2008

    3:22 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    SL10 writes:

    Thank god for A.C. in the home and car.

  • July 30, 2008

    4:29 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    carlindenver writes:

    Yes we are in a cyclical drought. However remember the temps and precip reports are from DIA. Fifteen plus miles east of Denver proper. And DIA cannot and does not report DIA's snow precip. For comparison: Denver7News-reports 5.60" to July 1st. Denver Water (near I-25 & 13th ave)-reports 5.21". And Live Stapleton Weather reports 4.70" so far this year. The Press and TV in Denver constantly ignore actual Denver Metro precip and at times temperature. DIA's weather is not Denver Metro.

  • July 30, 2008

    6:53 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    Darwin writes:

    I guess I'm breaking the law. I use the water from my clothes washer to water my plants and trees. Hopefully, if/when I get caught, I will just be given a warning the first time. lol :>)