SHOCKING AUGUST

It's been a shocking August for Toronto and I'll tell you why below, but first earlier today I asked you to please send me emails of your city's highs for today. You came through. By 2 pm, I was flooded with over 100 emails, seriously. My inbox said "You have 137 New Messages"...and that was just by 2. What I decided to do was to take the majority cities of the emails that we received. Throughout the course of the week I may post more. My main focus though is on Toronto for only one main reason: it's too warm.

Here are a couple of cities:

Calgary: 24

Toronto: 34

Ottawa: 20

Winnipeg: 22

Montreal: 28

Iqualuit: 8

New York: 33

Glens Falls: 34

Yonkers: 30

But now I will let you know about Toronto (GTA) and August. This may come as a shocker to you. One of the driest summer's on record will stretch into September. There's no significant rain in sight over the next 7 to 10 days. Most areas around the GTA have seen only about 20 mm of rain so far this month. An average August gets about 4 times that much rain. Areas to the north in the agricultural belt are really feeling the drought. Crops are hurting. Our Newmarket weather station has only recorded 5 mm of rain all month. That's coming off of a July where only 9 mm of rain fell in the area. That's only about 1/10th the amount of rain the area needs for good crop growth. It could be a pricey Halloween for pumpkins. (Info Courtesy: CityNews.ca)

Although the smog will stayeth away. It's headed on a trip away from Toronto. I'll have more information on the smog's departure early tomorrow, followed by a blog later on tomorrow night. Tomorrow I need to wake up early, so I can do more research. But by the time 9am tomorrow, I'll have the smog info for you.

Once again, thanks for your emails. If you want much more information on August's shocking weather, please email me city.weather@yahoo.ca and let me know you need more. I'll be glad to send it to you.

Chris (city.weather@yahoo.ca)