Source: NC CLIMATE OFFICE, 6/4/19


Sizzling summer temperatures and widespread dry weather made for a scorching May that saw drought emerge in a potentially unlikely area.

The Heat is On
We didn't have to wait for the start of meteorological summer on June 1 to feel summer-like heat across the state. Unseasonably warm temperatures over the past month culminated in our 3rd-warmest May since 1895 with a preliminary statewide average temperature of 71.0°F -- a full five degrees above the 1981 to 2010 monthly average.

The Bermuda high pressure system is often responsible for producing hot, humid summer weather, and it has been one of the main culprits so far this season. With that large-scale high sitting right off our southeast coast, we've seen an ongoing flow of warm, moist air from the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico.

That pattern was quick to set up and slow to shift, producing one of the warmest Mays on record in many locations, particularly across the Coastal Plain.

Based on average mean temperatures, it was the warmest May in Wilmington dating back 146 years, the warmest at Hatteras since 1893, and the warmest in Elizabeth City since 1934. Greenville and Fayetteville also recorded their warmest Mays last month.

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