Iowa’s now come full circle in the weather books in the last decade. Back in August of 1993, Iowa still had the musty smell of record rainfalls and flooding that soaked the state and led to all 99 counties being declared disaster areas. Ten years later State Climatologist Harry Hillaker says the preliminary figures show we had a record dry August with a statewide average rainfall total of 96-one-hundreths of an inch. He says the previous record low rainfall was one-point-zero-four inches in 1984. He says the normal August rainfall is four-point-one-nine inches of rain, so we had about one-fourth of the typical rainfall. Hillaker says the we’ve gone from a moisture surplus this year to a deficit of nearly five inches. He says we’re nearly five inches below normal — with two-thirds of the deficit coming in August. Hillaker says the lack of rainfall combined with a slight increase in temperatures.He says we average about three degrees above normal to give us the warmest August since 1995 — but still not even in the top 20 warmest. Hillaker says the warmer average is due mostly to the sweltering hot days at the end of the month. Temperatures this summer overall haven’t been anything unusual. He says other than the hot period at the end of August, the summer has been overall pretty average for temperatures. Hillaker doesn’t expect much change in the dry conditions until we hit October.
