Tom Velardi
Joined: Mon Oct 29, 2007 10:20 pm Posts: 4337 Location: Kyushu, Southern Japan (33.607N latitude)
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Year's summary, well, almost
The year isn't over yet, but here is a rundown on the average temperature and precipitation by month for Fukuoka City, Kyushu, Japan.
The * indicates readings up to 11/21 and ** average to date, also 11/21.
A quick perusal shows that we had a really dry spring with slightly above normal temperatures - yes, I was watering a lot! While January was fairly typical, February temperatures were well above normal. This is becoming a typical trend actually (since around 2000). The June monsoon was a bit on the dry side and also a bit late. Then all hell broke loose in July and the skies opened. By the end of July rainfall totals exceeded normal levels by over 230%. In my local area, the worst hit in this region, total rainfall for the month ranged between 700-1000mm depending on location - that is more than half the normal amount for the entire year. After the deluge of July, August dried out, especially by the end, and there was about half the normal rainfall for the month. Temperatures remained relatively cool however, despite the clear, sunny days - again, unusual. September followed a similar path as August, dry and relatively cool. October delivered slightly above normal temperatures and rainfall, but was pretty typical. November however, especially as of the last 10 days, has gotten cool rapidly and rainfall has exceeded norms by more than double. It looks like the average temperature for the month will be a bit above normal as well. It should be interesting to see what happens in December, especially with regard to temperature.
Trends: Winter - warmer than normal, precipitation normal (snowfall however has diminished); Spring - warmer than normal, and drier; Summer - normal temperatures, precipitation varying widely and abnormally; Fall - above average temperatures, and wetter than normal. Currently, the year will have total rainfall equaling or exceeding the norm, but the distribution of it was wacky as hell. The monsoon keeps coming late and dry and wet periods are becoming more variable throughout the year. On the temperature front, it looks like the average will fall somewhere near 18.0 C again, well above the normal level of 16.6 C (from 1971-2000 readings, if you go back another 50 years the average was more like 15.0 C). To date only two years have equaled or exceeded 18.0 C, 1998 (18.1 C) and 2007 (18.0 C). Prior to 1989 no year equaled or exceeded 17.0 C, and in the subsequent 19 years (and surly this year as well) 14 years averaged above 17.0 C. In fact, no year has averaged less than 17.1 C since 1997. Clearly Fukuoka is heating up.
I'll post the year's final averages in January.
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Tom Velardi
Joined: Mon Oct 29, 2007 10:20 pm Posts: 4337 Location: Kyushu, Southern Japan (33.607N latitude)
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Well December got more seasonal, with the average temperature coming in at 8.9 C, and so bringing the annual average down to 17.3 C. That is still nearly 2 degrees warmer than the average of a half century ago, and now 16 out of the last 21 years have been at or over 17 C (1989 being the first year to reach that level). On the precipitation front, it was on average a normal year with 1692 mm of liquid water, but as mentioned before, the distribution of it over the year was atypical.
This January, so far, is looking pretty normal with lows near freezing and highs around 5-7 degrees.
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