Last Month Was Portland’s Hottest August on Record

It was hot last month, huh?

The beginning of August brought days reaching 105 degrees, the hottest days since summer 2009, causing Portland General Electric customers to break power use records, using the most power in a single hour since that same summer. We made it to 57 days without rain, the third longest dry streak in history, and the air quality was the worst its been since 2015, reaching pollution levels higher than Shanghai, Beijing and New Delhi.

Whew.

Just to make it official: The National Weather Service is measuring August 2017 as Portland's hottest August ever, and not only because it hit 105 degrees.

The average temperature for the month of August in Portland was 76.3 degrees, which is the average of the high and the low temperature for each day, explains meteorologist Matthew Cullen. Last year's average August temperature was just 71.9 degrees.

Cullen says fluctuation year to year is normal, but from 1982 to 2010, the mean temperature for August was 69.5 degrees.

"Were about four degrees above the average, which is a fairly decent margin," says Cullen. "It's pretty big. Overnight lows were certainly a little higher and the high temperatures were the bigger component, so that's how we were able to get that higher than the record."

But just because the hottest August on record is over, don't get those sweaters out yet.

Don't even think about it, because we're about to enter another phase of very hot weather. NWS has a heat advisory out for Saturday afternoon through Tuesday morning, when they predict temperatures as high as 98 degrees.

"Starting tomorrow we're going to have a lengthy period of hot temperatures across the area," Cullen says.

Tomorrow and Sunday are expected to be about 95 for Portland, while Monday and Tuesday should see 97 to 98 degrees. It will be "all the way back down" to 92 on Wednesday.

If this year's winter and summer weather has felt a little extreme, it's because it is. NWS says that five months this year have been among the top coldest ever, and six months have been in the top wettest or driest ever.