July was hot and sweaty.
With an average temperature of 90.3, more than 3 degrees above normal, it was the third-hottest July on record in Tucson. The average high was 102.5 and the low 78.1 degrees.
It was above 100 degrees on 25 days, and above 105 on 15 of them, according to the monthly climate roundup of the National Weather Service.
Monsoon rain, which usually moderates temperatures, disappeared for more than two weeks in early July. Moisture levels remained high on many of those days, however, making it hot, humid and miserable.
The rain set records on the first day of July before it disappeared.
It came back with a vengeance, beginning last Tuesday. Tucson and much of Southern Arizona are now well above normal for monsoon rain totals, courtesy of a handful of extremely productive thunderstorms.
The official gauge at Tucson International Airport collected 3.32 inches for the month, giving it a monsoon total through July 31 of 4.71 inches. With two months to go, the normal total for the monsoon of 6.06 inches seems well within reach.
Monsoon season totals so far this year generally range from 2 to 5 inches of rain, but some parts of town, including multiple sites in midtown, received more than 8 inches, according to weather watchers at rainlog.org.
July’s heat record, an average temperature of 90.6, was set in 2005. In second place is 1994, with an average temperature of 90.4.
Tucson is on track to record its second-warmest summer and its third-warmest year, according to John Glueck of the National Weather Service, who compiled the climate data for the monthly report.
The monsoon storms continue into August, which is historically the most dependable and productive month for rain.
The monsoon is beginning to live up to its “aggressive onset” in late June, said climatologist Mike Crimmins of the University of Arizona.
“It took a couple weeks, but we’ve gotten into a really good monsoon pattern,” Crimmins said. Most of the state, with the noticeable exception of a portion of La Paz County, has now received measurable rain, he said.
Rain is predicted each day for the rest of the workweek with some drying expected by the weekend.
Temperatures, moderated for a few days by moisture, will again be on the rise — into the upper 90s by Sunday.
