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Your weekend weather

By: Doug Speirs

Posted: 08/4/2012 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

Before we get to your holiday weekend forecast, we need to hand out the first medals of the 2012 Winnipeg Weather Olympics.

As most weather fans know, there's been a lot of buzz around July 2012, with some observers arguing this red-hot month might be one for the record books.

When I asked my expert pal Dale Marciski from Environment Canada how to analyze last month, he said: "It's something to remember. It was a pretty warm month. There were 14 days when the daily high got above 30 C. The normal is four days above, so we had a lot more hot days than normal.

"The single hottest day was July 29, when the temperature hit 35.4 C. We also had four days when the humidex was 40 or greater. We had a 42 on July 19."

With that in mind, the gold medal for hottest July in Winnipeg history goes to... (Insert cheesy Olympic theme music here)... July 1936, with an average temperature of 24.2 C.

The monthly average is calculated by adding together the daily highs and the nightly lows.

The silver medal goes to... (cue over-excited announcer squealing with delight)... A THREE-WAY TIE FOR SECOND PLACE. July 1914, 1916 and 1935 are deadlocked with an average temperature of 22.4 C.

And get ready to sweat with pride, because the bronze medal, and the honour of being the hottest July since 1936 goes to... July 2012, which scorched its way to a stunning average temperature of 22.3 C.

Before you run out to buy commemorative T-shirts, let's take a look at today's weather, which, thanks to a trough of low pressure, will be a bit ugly. The outlook calls for showers ending in the afternoon, risk of a thunderstorm, winds gusting to 60 km/h and a high of just 20 C, well down from the normal high of 26 C.

But don't despair, weather fans, because Dale points out a ridge of high pressure will bring us sunny skies and warmer temperatures starting Sunday, with a high of 26 C. It'll be sunny the rest of the week with an Olympic-calibre high of 30 C on Thursday.

We can celebrate our medal-winning July by heading to the Scotiabank Stage at The Forks from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. today for the official Folklorama kickoff, featuring ambassadors from more than 40 pavilions and live cultural entertainment from local and international groups. The multicultural festival runs Aug. 5 to 18.

Get your Viking on this weekend at (take a deep breath) Islendingadagurinn, the annual Icelandic Festival of Manitoba, which runs to Monday at Gimli and features, among other things, pancake breakfasts, road races, the Viking encampment, beach volleyball, fireworks and rousing games of fris-nok.

For those who want to rock, head out to Minnedosa for Rockin' the Fields, featuring Finger Eleven, The Northern Pikes, Kenny Shields & Streetheart and more. Tickets at Ticketmaster.

Weather watchers can look for a minor disturbance Saturday in the atmosphere at my house when my wife returns from a trip to B.C. and discovers I haven't done dishes all week. The outlook calls for a 40 per cent chance of me never being seen again!

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition August 4, 2012 A2

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