Dennis’ Local Almanac

By DENNIS McTIGHE

Marine layer still hanging around

Today would’ve been my Grandma Harriet’s birthday. What a wonderful soul she was. She was born on June 6, 1890 in Germany and came to the U.S. when she was 16. She settled in Pittsburgh, Pa. where she met Anthony McTighe, my Grandpa and she gave birth to three wonderful sons, William, Frank and John. Frank James McTighe was my Pop. I came from very good stock and was blessed with loving, caring parents. It’s not their fault I’m messed up!

Although the sun did break through a bit this past weekend which was a welcome sight, this season’s unrelenting gloom is not loosening its grip much and shows no sign of letting up anytime soon, as the worst gloom attack of all time continues. Daytime high temps are running 8 to 10 degrees below normal and the water’s still cold at 60-62 degrees. Our desert regions are also running below normal with afternoon temps barely clearing 90 when it should be at around 102-104. The marine layer has been consistently thick at 5,000 ft. or more. Where are you, Senor El Niño? We haven’t even had a decent summer since 2014.

More on dew points: The dew point kind of dictates how comfortable or uncomfortable the surrounding air feels on our skin. Here in Laguna, our dew point usually runs at fairly tolerable levels which is in the low to mid 50s. When the dew point is around 60, the surrounding air feels a tiny bit muggy, but not too bad. When our dew point is 65 or so, there is some discomfort, but not unbearable. When the dew point reaches 70, which is rare in these parts, it becomes squirm time as perspiration significantly increases.

By the time it reaches 75 or higher, things get a bit unbearable. At 80, it’s miserable. In all the years I’ve been keeping daily records, the highest dew point I’ve recorded was in July 2015 when the air temp was 84 and the relative humidity was at 76% which translates into a dew point of 76, highly unusual for our region.

However, during the summer, especially east of the Rockies, dew points of 70-75 are quite common and even 80 is reached on occasions – especially when severe thunderstorms are in that given area. Relative humidity routinely is expressed as a percentage. Temperature largely determines the maximum amount of water vapor the air can hold. Warm air can hold more water vapor than cool air. Relative humidity expresses the degree of saturation. Air with 100% humidity is saturated, like when there’s a thick fog – and anything less than 100% is unsaturated. When temp and humidity are identical, the air is saturated.

Later in the week, there’s an upper level low that is expected to park off our coast for a couple of days. That could trigger some thunderstorm activity not only in our local mountains, but there’s also a chance of some of that activity in our coastal areas as well with some sprinkles or isolated squally type showers. Stay tuned on that one. That low could chase away some of that stubborn marine layer that’s been loitering here for weeks! See you next week.

Until then, ALOHA