CALGARY -- Has it seemed cold so far in 2020? Not really, right? David Spence put out this chart here:

So instead of falling below normal by drastic amounts, our forecast has been tailing along. Instead of higher highs and lower lows, we’ve just been… flat. No major swings to the positive have brought us only three days at 25° or above thus far. Medicine Hat and Fort McMurray have both had at least four 25° days for the first half of July, for comparison’s sake (and 20 and 12 total days in 2020, respectively).

Not to put too much additional salt on it, but here are some other community totals for days in 2020 that have risen to or above 25°, factoring for forecast highs today:

  • Toronto: 40 days
  • Montreal: 39
  • Winnipeg: 37
  • Edmonton: 5
  • Calgary: 3
  • Inuvik: 3
  • Yellowknife: 2

Yikes, right?

So what’s going wrong? Really, nothing. We’re situated in the low 20s for the next few days, but have rarely hit that lovely trifecta of westerly wind with a high pressure airmass above and basked in the resultant sun of the latter. If our temperatures fall flat and hunker in near the normal, especially when that normal is 20-23°, we aren’t in cold climes. We’re in normal seasonal conditions without “high highs” or “low lows”, our numbers seem to reflect a cooler temperature base.

Here are our DayLites:

We’re riding along a ridge tomorrow and then a trough through the following days, driving our temperatures below normal for the remainder of the forecast week. This line of upper air activity is going to be packed with moisture that will drop into the lower levels, primarily in central Alberta, for the coming days, and with this trough moving in, it will be ripe for triggering showers and thundershowers at times.

Even in the coming days, we’re sitting near normal. That’s not terrible! Earlier models this week were calling for temps as far down the mercury dial as 16-17° for highs. As always, we Calgarians shall ride it out.

Here’s the forecast:

Today:

  • Partly cloudy, scattered shower potential, peak wind gusts 30-35 km/h this aft.
  • Daytime high: 22°
  • Evening: mainly clear, low 12°

Tomorrow:

  • Sunny!
  • Daytime high: 26°
  • Evening: chance for thundershowers, low 11°

Friday:

  • Mainly cloudy, late-day showers and thundershowers possible
  • Daytime high: 21°
  • Evening: clear, low 11°

Saturday:

  • Partly cloudy, late-day thundershower potential
  • Daytime high: 22°
  • Evening: light showers, low 10°

Sunday:

  • Partly cloudy, late-day thundershower potential
  • Daytime high: 20°
  • Evening: spotty showers, low 11°

CTV Calgary videojournalist extraordinaire Chad Tweten sent over a great photograph he took of Calgary’s goat herd chomping down!

McHugh Bluff, goats,

You can submit your weather photos here.