Published: July 7, 2023
Parts of western Florida are seeing drier and warmer conditions to start the rainy season.
While the beginning of June often signifies the beginning of change in the Sunshine State toward persistently humid and hot conditions, this rainy season has been different.
The rainy season, which typically runs from late May or June through September, has been largely absent in parts of the state. This also means that the state's natural air conditioning has been absent.
Drier ground heats up more during the afternoon than it would if regular rains fell. This can lead to a vicious feedback loop. A few communities in Central Florida have reached 100 degrees, which despite its latitude, is not a common occurrence.
Tampa, Sarasota, Fort Myers, and Naples are all having a top 5 warmest summer through July 6. While Naples has a relatively short period of record (22 years), it is having its warmest summer to date. Many cities in the southern half of the state have seen record highs.
The southern tier of the U.S. has been dogged by stubborn domes of high pressure that have lasted weeks at a time. Florida has only been on the edge of the patterns this rainy season, but this has put the state in its own stubborn zonal (or west-to-east) flow.
(MORE: June 2023 Was the Hottest June on Record)
Sea breeze patterns are the star of the rainy season in Florida outside of a tropical storm or hurricane interrupting regularly scheduled business. And that has been the case this year, but instead of alternating coasts from one day to the next, the east coast of Florida has been receiving the wealth of the rainfall so far.
This is due to the location of the domes of high pressure so far, which have been located over Texas or Mexico, or occasionally nudging into the Lower Mississippi Valley. Clockwise flow around these heat domes has assisted thunderstorm development along the sea breeze eastward across the state.
Much of northern Florida has also had above normal rainfall recently due to disturbances called ridge riders that have rounded the heat domes from the Plains to the Southeast or East. Many of these disturbances dropped heavy rain in the panhandle and across the northern Gulf Coast.
(MORE: CSU Ups Its Hurricane Season Forecast)
While intermittent showers have popped up on Florida’s west coast, they’ve remained warm and dry while the east coast has had boomers most afternoons. Many of the ridge riders died out before producing rain on the peninsula.
This is so much the fact that a good chunk of the coast is now in severe drought, which is typically eradicated as the rainy season begins.
U.S. Drought Monitor - Released July 6Only three other years in the last two decades have had severe-level or worse drought conditions.
This overall pattern isn’t expected to change any time soon. Outlooks from both The Weather Company/Atmospheric G2 and NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center for July expect warmer than average temperatures.
Weather patterns have led to the warmer and drier conditions in parts of Florida this year, but changes in climate are making warmer summers more likely.
In a recent study from Climate Central, nearly every city that they studied in Florida has seen an increase in extremely hot days. In fact, Tallahassee has seen an extra month of 95-degree days added since 1970.
The warmer conditions have also led to more humid conditions this year where rain is falling.
In Miami, Brian McNoldy has been reporting on record high heat index values, too.
The combined effects of the lack of rainfall, the higher temperatures and higher humidity have led to numerous days of heat alerts across various parts of Florida in recent weeks.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
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