“Usually, the weather is at least much warmer in the first half of August than the weather in mid-May. This is determined not by the length of the day, but by the well-warmed surface soil layer, surface waters, and surrounding seas, local air masses, which are richer in water vapor and various impurities, and ‘brought-in’ warmer air masses arriving from more heated land areas or marine waters.
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It is still too early to judge the whole summer, as it is rare for all summer months in a certain region to be similar in thermal and moisture conditions. The exception might be monsoon climate regions, but even there, due to the variability of factors affecting monsoon intensity, there are greater or lesser differences.
Although June was forecasted (by long-term forecast methods) to be cooler both in the Baltic region and Lithuania, according to LHMT data it was on average even 1.8 °C warmer than the multi-year average. This was influenced by a heat wave that reached Lithuania in the middle of the third ten-day period of June. July, most likely (final data are not yet available today), will be close to normal, as the beginning of the month was cooler, the middle around normal, and the end warmer.
But even such a “normal” month had several hot days at the beginning, middle, and today, at the end. These short-term July heat waves are echoes of strong heat waves, of which Southwest, parts of Western and Central Europe have already counted four this season. Prolonged strong heat (average daily maximum air temperature > 32 °C, and instantaneous maximum air temperature > 37 °C) and tropical nights (minimum daily air temperature ≥ 20 °C) not only caused intense droughts but also forest and shrub fires, the scale and intensity of which are the greatest in the last 70–80 years,” writes the meteorologist about the recent summer months.
According to him, water resources are even worse in the largest European rivers (except Eastern Europe) and some lakes. The most affected were the basins of the Danube, Rhine, Garonne, and other rivers. In some rivers, such as the Tisza, which drains the territories of Hungary, Romania, Serbia, and Ukraine, absolute minimum water levels are being recorded this year, probably since the beginning of hydrological observations.
What weather to expect in August?
According to the meteorologist, hot weather will quickly (on Saturday) leave Lithuania due to changed atmospheric circulation conditions, but very warm and dry air mass will remain nearby – over Central and Southwestern Europe.
“The next attempt of tropical air mass intrusion into the Baltic countries is forecast for next Tuesday–Wednesday. However, Lithuania will remain in a zone of large hydrothermal gradients next week, so sudden weather changes and unstable weather forecasts (rapidly changing) should persist throughout the week.
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Moreover, such conditions cause large territorial contrasts in weather and air temperature. If official weather forecasts could be divided into two scenarios, one would precisely correspond to the above-mentioned conditions, where warm or even hot weather would prevail almost all week in the south and southeast of the country, while cool weather would dominate in the west and northwest. The other scenario at the beginning of next week would be similar to the first – warm and mostly dry, and in the second half of the week and next weekend – cool and wet,” writes Associate Professor Gintautas Stankūnavičius.
“As mentioned, the initial conditions for digital weather forecasting are not stable enough these days, so longer-term forecasts are not very reliable. Shorter-term forecasts inform about a sudden weather change tomorrow, Saturday.
A slow-moving cold wavy atmospheric front will pass over Lithuania. The front itself, as seen already today, is not homogeneous, so there will be no unified precipitation (mostly showers) zone. Different segments of varying intensity are expected,” writes the meteorologist.
According to him, the front should pass through the entire territory of Lithuania by Sunday morning, but large amounts of convective energy (CAPE > 2000 J/kg) are forecast in the front zone, especially in the afternoon and evening hours, which may initiate hail, strong thunderstorms, or even (very unlikely) tornado phenomena. Also, the daily precipitation amount, depending on the intensity of convection, may vary from 0.5 to 40 mm. Such small-scale but intense phenomena are difficult to predict accurately, but apparently, a more precise official forecast will be published tomorrow morning, according to him.
“August is not only the last summer month but also a vacation time for many, so there is interest in what kind of weather will prevail in Lithuania or another vacation country. According to long-term forecast data, weather trends in the first half of the month will remain similar to July: warmer and drier (at least one more heat wave is forecast) than usual in Central and Southwestern Europe (in Southern Europe, this is climatically probably the driest time of the year), and cooler in Northern and Eastern Europe. The second half of the month should be warmer than normal in the Baltic region and Eastern Europe,” forecasts the meteorologist.
