State Climatologist Justin Glisan says 2026 is on a pace through nine months to finish high up in the weather record book.
“We’re in the top ten for warmest temperatures on an annual basis. Also around the top ten wettest year on record,” he says. Glisan says the yearly precipitation total is sitting at number seven following the wet September. “This ranks behind 1881, 1993 as the second, 2010, 2008, 2019, and 1882. So some very, very wet years,” he says.
Glisan says this very strong El Nino event we are in could continue pushing the us up the record list. “Generally, we see warmer temperatures through fall, but also near normal to slightly wetter conditions,” he says. “So it’s looking like if this year continues to act similarly as last strong El Nino events, we should continue to rack up rainfall and precipitation through the end of the year. So we might see that ranking increase through the end of the year.”
Glisan says there are indications the rainfall will slow a bit in the next few weeks. “If you look at the short term outlooks that get us to the first half of October, we’re seeing a strong signal for both warmer temperatures, but also an a dry signal, which would be excellent news given how wet things have been,” Glisan says. Glisan says farmers need the dry conditions to get he harvest completed.
Glisan says there were few sunny days in September and that tends to get people more engaged in talking about the forecasts and rain numbers. “Engagement is a good word for that. So yeah, you have to have a thick skin when you’re a meteorologist or a climatologist, especially when we’re working through extreme events. It makes our jobs interesting, of course. But yes, there’s a lot of, everybody talks about the weather. It impacts everyone,” he says. Glisan says he looks to the positive that the wet September brought. “We’ve really quashed drought across the state. In fact, we’ve resupplied deep soil profiles. This will be good to replenish at least some aquifer moisture that we lost from the 2020 through 2023 drought, the longest drought since the 1950s. So you always have to find a silver lining there,” he says.
Glisan says he loves his job and enjoys positive or negative talk about the weather and its ramifications.
