Warmest March on Record ends on a mild and sunny note

Weather Data from the Month of March

Sunshine and Warm Temperatures marked a fitting end to March of 2012 as temperatures in Southern Manitoba again soared into the high teens on the weekend. According to Rob's Blog "In Winnipeg the high of 18.8C Saturday was just 0.1C off the record high of 18.9C for the 31st, set back in 1963." The warm finish made the monthly mean temperature pretty close to 2C or 2.2C, probably the warmest March on record since record keeping books started in the city in 1872. Overall the month was a astounding 8C above the normal, considering the 30 year normal is -6C. We were also 0.6C above the previous warmest month of March of +1.6C, set back in 1878. Now if only we can continue this trend into april so we can break more significantly old records.



A historical 12 day March scorcher through the mid part of the month was responsible for the record breaking month,which helped smash some of the all time March records throughout southern Manitoba and a Broad Scope of Central North America into Ontario. The March heat wave aided rapidly in melting our 25cm snow pack in portions of southern Manitoba, within just a few days. All between the 10th and the 14th, temperatures were more typical of early May in the time period from the 11th and the 23rd. The month also set 8 new daily record highs in Winnipeg,including all time warmest March temperature of 23.7C on the 19th.

Although all of this warm weather in March may not completely signal a start to a warm spring, as Rob mentioned "of the past 9 previous warmest Marches in Winnipeg, only 4 were followed by above normal temperatures in April, and ALL had below normal temperatures in May! Those springs had an average of 20 freeze days in April, and 9 in May with frosts well into mid to late May (even the first week of June some years!)". Also you may not want to put your snow shovels away yet,we can still see measurable snow in between the months of April to May. Rob said "Of those past 9 warm Marches, all were followed by some measurable snow in April (including a 25 cm snowstorm April 15-17, 1910), and 4 had snow in May". So don't let this warm start to Spring fool you! This is Winter Peg after all, and a warm start to the spring anywhere in the province is no guarantee that the cold weather is over!

                  
Below is a review of all the records that were broken last month Via (A Weather Moment blog)

• 8 daily record high temperatures (11, 12, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 22)
• Earliest 20°C reading on record (March 18)
• Warmest overnight low in March (14°C on the night of March 18/19)
• Earliest thunderstorm on record since 1953 (Evening of March 19th)
• Warmest March day on record (March 19th, 23.7°C)
• Most significant departure from normal temperature for any day of the year (+23.4°C above normal on March 19th)
• 4 consecutive days over 19°C (Only 4 days since records began have reached that mark. From Rob’s Blog: In other words, it took only 4 days during this warm spell to match what took 140 years to accomplish.)
• Warmest March on Record (Mean temperature of 2.2°C, beating the previous record of 1.6°C set in 1878).
• Highest dew point in March (17°C on March 19th, need to finish parsing data set to verify)

            Top 5 warmest Marches in Winnipeg (since 1872) Via Rob's Blog
                1. 2012 .......... +2.2C
                2. 1878 .......... +1.6C 
                3. 1910 .......... +1.0C
                4. 1973 .......... +0.5C
                5. 2000 .......... -0.1C