Beautiful ‘abnormal’ warmth for Waterloo Region on the way

Frank Seglenieks is coordinator of the Eric D. Soulis Weather Station at the University of Waterloo.

He says this week is going to be “abnormally warm.”

Environment Canada is predicting a daytime high of 24 degrees Monday with mainly sunny conditions. That comes after a high of 20 degrees on Saturday and 23 degrees on Sunday.

“We're going to get into the mid 20s, which is something we see occasionally here in the late October, but it's rare to have 2 or 3 days sort of at that level,” Seglenieks said.

Not only is it warm and sunny this weekend, but there’s been a lack of precipitation in the forecast lately too.

September was in the books for being one of the top 10 driest in the last 100 years and October is on pace to hit the same record.

“If you look at the satellite image, there's basically not a cloud across the whole eastern seaboard of North America. So, really, we are in this dry period that's lasted since the beginning of September.”

Seglenieks says it’s almost like a shifting of seasons.

“It really does follow, though, a pattern that we've seen over the past 10 [to] 15 years where the fall temperature, both September and October, generally increase and have generally been more above average.”

While the fall is warming up, he says statistics show the spring is very slowly cooling down.

“The spring temperatures are generally about the same or maybe even decreasing a bit.”