Thursday was even hotter, as I cracked the 90° mark for the first time this year under sunny, dry skies. The Thursday maximum temperature reached 90.5° @ 1537 while the Thursday minimum temperature was only 61.9° @ 0622. The dew point temperatures continued to rise on Thursday, still somewhat dry but cracking the 60° mark for the first time, ranging from a low of 50° @ 0000 up to a high of 63° @ 1159. The barometric pressure started out a bit higher early, reaching 30.12″ @ 0836 down to a low of 29.96″ later @ 1756. The relative humidity rose a bit on the low side, ranging from a high of 72% at 0604 down to a low of 35% at 1414.

With this week’s heat, the leaves are really budding out quickly. Today’s featured image tries to convey that as taken on Thursday afternoon, May 3 during a GLOBE CLOUD observation photo shoot. This picture displayed did not get uploaded to GLOBE, not really showing clouds on it but it sure is getting green!!  

Remember now you can get the VP2 data on Weatherlink. You can access the data through http://www.weatherlink.com/user/walrusman444

I am posting daily to weather underground. My ID is KMDROCKV200 and my station is called “Gardens of Traville.” Data is online, normally just about in real-time. The web address for my data on weather underground is: https://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=KMDrockv200#history/ I contribute daily to cocorahs as Rockville 2.8 WNW, Station ID MD-MG-115 on https://www.cocorahs.org/ Please remember that Weather Underground does not report snow data, and reflects what is recorded automatically through the tipping bucket VP2 gauge. I use the data I post to cocorahs as my “official” precipitation total each day.

Thursday was sunny and hotter, with high temps rising over the 90° mark for the first time this year with lows only in the low 60s as we continue our early May “mini-heat wave”. Overnight into Friday we had clear skies early and mild temps, with lows only falling into the mid 60s, but with a high overcast developing towards sunrise that continues currently. Friday looks to turn partly cloudy later and still hot, with high temps around 90° and lows in the low 60s. There is a slight chance for storms later in the day. Saturday should cool off quite a bit under cloudy skies and a 60 POP for PM showers, highs in the low 70s and lows in the mid 50s. Sunday continues the cloudy skies and even cooler temps, with a 70 POP for rain, highs in the mid-upper 60s and lows in the low 50s. Monday should be partly sunny with highs in the low 70s and lows in the upper 40s. Tuesday should turn sunny with highs in the low 70s and lows around 50°.

On the Channel 4 radar at 0922 the 4 state mid-Atlantic region shows scattered showers in parts of the western half of PA and the northern half of WV, moving ENE currently that should miss our area today as it looks now.

As of 0922 Friday, the data from the VP2 (coming from the ground radiation shield about 4 feet off the ground just under and out from the balcony) and the Lakewood WX Bug station are as follows:

Cloudy, warm and calm – still looks to be one more hot one for Friday !!

Station Relative Location Temp  RH   DP     BP       Wind High/Low temp for Thursday
VP2            Ground         72.2° 72% 63° 30.01″S    NA    90.5°/61.9°

The total precipitation in the cocorahs gauge was 0.00″ through midnight Thursday. The VP2 tipping bucket rain gauge under my balcony also recorded 0.00″ through midnight Thursday.

Thursday’s precipitation was 0.00″
May precipitation is 0.00″
Year-to-date precipitation total is 11.74″

WX Bug Lakewood 4500 ft, 72° 64% 60° 30.06″S SSW 2 G WSW 4
                            140° from station                        93°/62°
The Lakewood rain gauge reported 0.00″ of precipitation on Thursday. May shows 0.00″ and there is an unchanged 2018 year-to-date (YTD) amount of 14.81″. I still believe at times the great disparity between the Lakewood WX Bug station precipitation amount total for the month and year and my cocorahs gauge based data is that the Lakewood precip values are estimated/adjusted from radar.

At 2400 obs Tuesday night the temperature from the VP2 was 78.4° RH 54% BP 30.01″S DP 60.4°
Clear, warm, dry at 2400

Good morning from the cloudy, warm, but dry home of the walrus early on this Friday. With my daughter and grandson taking up much of my time the next several days, I may or may not be able to regularly report here as much, if at all, each day so don’t worry about me. We look to have some fun and catching up to do.