{"id":27314,"date":"2024-06-06T23:18:16","date_gmt":"2024-06-07T05:18:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/record-breaking-heat-wave-comes-to-sw-colorado\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T23:56:35","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:56:35","slug":"record-breaking-heat-wave-comes-to-sw-colorado","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/record-breaking-heat-wave-comes-to-sw-colorado\/","title":{"rendered":"Record-breaking heat wave comes to SW Colorado"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"A
A Colorado Department of Transportation employee knocks back a bottle of water on Thursday while heat waves rise from new asphalt laid on the Bodo Industrial Park frontage roads. Temperatures in the low 90s on Thursday are forecast to hit 95 degrees Friday and 96 degrees on Monday, 5-10 degrees above normal for mid-July. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A heat wave that is impacting much of the Southwestern U.S. settled into Southwest Colorado on Wednesday, causing the mercury to hit 92 degrees in Durango \u2013 matching a historical record for the day, according to the National Weather Service in Grand Junction.<\/p>\n

The above-average temperatures are expected to stick around through Saturday.<\/p>\n

Thursday and Friday are expected to set records in Durango with a high of 96 and 95, respectively, and Saturday is forecast to match the record of 91, according to the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n

The previous records for Thursday and Friday were 92 and 91, meaning the heat wave could break the records by 4 degrees. Records have been kept consistently since 1996.<\/p>\n

Durango will begin to get some relief on Sunday with a high of 88, and Monday is expected have a high of 82.<\/p>\n

Sunday and Monday are expected to include some cloud cover with a cold front moving in from the northwest. Sunday includes a 20% to 30% chance of scattered showers, and Monday has a 40% to 60% chance of showers.<\/p>\n

If there is rain, it will probably be a tenth of an inch or less. Heavier, more reliable rain is expected on Sunday and Monday in the San Juan Mountains.<\/p>\n

Tom Renwick, senior meteorologist at the National Weather Service, said the culprit behind this week\u2019s record-breaking temperatures are two phenomena known as \u201cwarm advection\u201d and \u201ccompressional heating.\u201d<\/p>\n

Warm advection, in layman\u2019s terms, is simply the process of warmer air flowing into an area, usually from somewhere farther south. In the case of this week\u2019s heat wave, a counterclockwise spinning low-pressure zone located around the Baja California peninsula and a clockwise spinning high-pressure zone in Texas are working in tandem to send warm air toward Southwest Colorado.<\/p>\n

At the same time, a high-pressure zone is moving in from the south. The higher pressure compresses air, which causes it to warm \u2013 hence compressional heating.<\/p>\n

According to the National Weather Service, Cortez can expect a high of 96 on Thursday, 95 on Friday, 94 on Saturday, 91 on Sunday and 85 on Monday. Pagosa Springs can expect a high of 91 on Thursday, 89 on Friday, 88 on Saturday, 85 on Sunday and 78 on Monday.<\/p>\n

The warmer temperatures in Cortez and cooler temperatures in Pagosa Springs relative to Durango can mostly be chalked up to a weaker compressional heating effect, attributable to their lower and higher elevations respectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince you\u2019re at a lower elevation, you actually have more sky above you that\u2019s pushing down,\u201d Renwick said. \u201cYou can\u2019t feel it, but it makes a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

One entity that isn\u2019t too bothered by the heat wave is Cream Bean Berry, an ice cream shop on Main Avenue whose production manager, Monea Monroe, said: \u201cWe check the weather every week. Generally, the cloudier it is the less customers and the sunnier it is the more customers. It\u2019s supposed to be in the 90s this week, so we\u2019re busy getting ready.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not everyone can just walk into the freezer when the sun starts to scorch, though.<\/p>\n

William Kelso, who has spent the past 12 years backpacking cross-country, shared his disappointment with the heat.<\/p>\n

\u201cI come north in the summer to escape the heat and now it looks like I\u2019ve got to go a little bit farther north,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s frustrating because I have to go so many more miles into rougher country just to stay cool. Durango\u2019s nice. I\u2019d rather just stay cool here.\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s not alone. Cole Lawrence moved to Durango recently from Colorado Springs and expressed his surprise toward the early June heat wave.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew it was closer to New Mexico, but I didn\u2019t know it was going to be this hot,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m going to need to buy more shorts and T-shirts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even locals can\u2019t stand it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s pretty exhausting, especially if you go outside. It just drains your energy,\u201d said Peter Condrat, an incoming sophomore at Durango High School, who said this heat wave follows a marked trend across his young life. \u201cI feel like in Durango the summers get hotter and the winters get shorter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Humans aren\u2019t the only ones struggling to beat the heat.<\/p>\n

Kaiya, a bulldog-mix, panted profusely in Buckley Park. Her owner Rob Horn said: \u201cThere\u2019s fake wood over there for a temporary sidewalk and she walked on it and burned her paws. She also has a shorter snout and can\u2019t cool down as well as other dogs, so we have to be careful she doesn\u2019t get heat stroke.\u201d<\/p>\n

Horn will have to keep his guard up because according to the National Weather Service, Durango is expected to have a warmer and drier summer than average.<\/p>\n

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the region has already been getting warmer and drier for the past 30 years. So although this week marked the first record-breaking temperatures of a summer come early, they might not be the last.<\/p>\n

nmetcalf@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thursday and Friday are forecast to be hottest on record<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27315,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-27314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27314"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27314\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80019,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27314\/revisions\/80019"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27314"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=27314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}