Spring is officially here, and with it come high temperatures. As a result the National Weather Service’s Grand Junction office put a red flag warning in effect for most of Wednesday in Southwest Colorado at an elevation below 8,000 feet.
The agency set the warning because of low humidity, strong winds and high temperatures.
A cold front that moved into Southwestern Colorado late Thursday night provided a brief respite from this week’s record-tying heat.
Temperatures on Friday are set to peak at 56 degrees and an overnight low of 24. Saturday and Sunday, skies are also slated for sunshine, with highs around 68 and overnight lows in the 30s.
If April shapes up to be anything like March, it’s going to be a warm and dry month, according to local meteorologist Jim Andrus.
On March 30, the NWS recorded a temperature of 76 degrees in Cortez, a record-high that hasn’t been reached since 1966. Andrus noticed some records breaking in March, including hitting 74 degrees on March 17 which eclipsed the long-standing record of 70 degrees set in 1972.
“We’re definitely above normal for the month of March,” he said.
In terms of rainfall, Montezuma County saw 0.84 inches of precipitation in March, putting the area at 81 percent of normal for the month.
Year-to-date through the end of March, Andrus has recorded an average of 3.41 inches of precipitation.
“Normal to the end of March is 2.68 inches ... which amounts to 119 percent of normal for year-to-date through March,” he said.
Trends show there will be less water in the future. Tree-ring data show that between 760 AD and 2005, wet periods and dry periods each last 30 years.
“We could be faced with another 15 years of drought based on that trend,” said Steve Harris, of Harris Water Engineering in Durango.
While rainfall totals are looking up from last year, Andrus looks to California’s drought crisis as an reason to conserve even when levels are normal.
California Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday ordered mandatory water use reductions for the first time in California’s history, saying the state’s four-year drought had reached near-crisis proportions after a winter of record-low snowfalls.
“We’re better than last year definitely, but given how dry March was as and seeing what’s happening in California, we should become water aware and become as careful with water as we can; we’re still subject and in a very long drought period.”