(Area) State Climatologist Justin Glisan says June was an interesting month with wetter than normal conditions in eastern Iowa and drier than normal conditions in western Iowa.
Overall rainfall in the state averaged out at five inches which is right in line with the historical average of 5.02.” However, southwest Iowa was especially dry. Atlantic, for example, was nearly five inches shy of a typical June rainfall total. “Atlantic only received 1.03″ of rainfall. That’s 4.8″ below normal so pretty dry in Atlantic. The highest 24 hour rainfall of 0.57″ occurred between 6:00 a.m. on the 9th and 6:00 a.m. on the 10th. Measurable rain fell on only eight days of the month.”
For Atlantic that’s the 8th driest June on record. “And the record goes back to 1893. The driest June on record was in 1911 at .3″ and the most recent dry year besides 2020 looks to be 2002 and that was at .84″ which was the 5th driest. So it was a top ten dry June for Atlantic.”
Models and forecasts point towards more dry weather in the near term, but relative humidity levels are rising which could lead to some pop up showers and thunderstorms. The three month outlook into September shows an elevated chance of warmer than normal conditions, but some good news on the precipitation front. “Kind of a flip from what we’ve seen recently. There’s a signal for wetter than average conditions. So hopefully we don’t have an extended stretch of dryness.”
June was warmer than typical including as much as 4-5 degrees warmer than usual in western Iowa. 94 degrees was the highest temperature recorded in Atlantic which came on the 3rd and the 5th. The coolest overnight low was 50 degrees on the 24th. The average high of 86 degrees was three degrees above normal and the average low was five degrees warmer than normal at 63 degrees.
