Fall is 13th warmest
CARIBOU, Maine — Temperatures were 1.5 to 4 degrees above normal this fall in northern and eastern Maine, according to the National Weather Service.
Temperatures during the three-month period September to November made this fall the 13th warmest on record for the region dating to the 1920s, according to Rich Norton, meteorologist with the weather service’s Caribou office.
At Caribou, the average three-month temperature of 46.1 degrees was 2.8 degrees above the 30-year average temperature, and helped delay the peak of fall foliage season by up to two weeks.
The fall started on a very warm note, with September being the second-warmest on record in Caribou and the third-warmest in Houlton and Bangor, Norton said. The weather turned much cooler in October, and the month ended with temperatures from 1 to 3 degrees below average in those areas.
At Caribou, a total of 8.82 inches of rain and melted snow was observed over the same period, which was 1.65 inches below normal precipitation, ranking it the 11th driest fall on record. Only 4.1 inches of snow was observed, which was 8 inches below normal, placing this autumn behind only 2006 as the least snowy fall on record at Caribou, according to the weather service.
In Bangor, a total of 11.73 inches of rain was observed this fall, which was 83 hundredths of an inch above normal. Nearly half of that rainfall occurred on just one day — Sept. 30 — when 5.27 inches of rain was recorded.
A storm system in mid-October produced the first measurable snowfall for many areas north of Bangor with up to 6 inches of snow in parts of the Katahdin region. A storm system at the end of October produced 3 to 4 inches of rain in parts of Washington County.
November was warmer and drier than normal with well below normal snowfall. Temperatures averaged from 2 to 4 degrees above normal and precipitation ranged from 40 to 65 percent of normal. It ranked as the ninth warmest and ninth driest November on record at Caribou. The Bangor area experienced the 12th driest November on record.
A total of 3.8 inches of snow was observed at Caribou, making it the ninth least snowy November on record.
