If August 2008’s weather thus far had to be summed up in one word it would be WET!  Last Thursday a low pressure system began moving into the region from Saskatchewan, Canada.  Ahead of the system a cold front moved into northeastern Colorado and by Friday that low pressure had settled over Colorado. 

Over a three day period through Sunday morning, this produced lots of rain and record cool temperatures.  As it stands today in fact, August 2008 has climbed to # 3 on the all-time wettest August’s on record – and we still have 12 days left in the month. 

Denver’s top 5 wettest Augusts

5.85″   1979
4.47 ”  1951
4.03″   2008  (4.76″ recorded in Thornton)
3.87″   1923
3.69″   1991

While our August moisture has been great, it has not erased the deficit in precipitation overall for 2008.  Up until this month, we had nine straight months with below average precipitation.  Through the end of August, Denver historically averages 12.07 inches of precipitation.  As of today, even with our record setting August, we only have recorded 7.31 inches in 2008.  Certainly the recent storm highlights that we could easily catch up with one or two wet systems moving through but it does also serve as a reminder that we are still quite dry. 

Record temperatures too!  With the wet cold front came record setting cool temperatures too.  Friday, August 15th, Denver reached 59 degrees which demolished the previous record low maximum temperature of 68 degrees set in 1880.  Saturday, August 16th we reached 58 degrees which again broke the previous record low maximum for the date of 63 degrees set in 1890.  ThorntonWeather.com recorded 58 and 57.2 on August 15th and 16th respectively.