The visitor center, from the Allée side. NPS/Brenda Schwartz.
The National Park Service's Eastern Rivers and Mountains Network tracks ecosystem "vital signs" in parks in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York — among them weather and climate. This is its summary of 2022 at Flight 93 National Memorial, using county-level data for Somerset County, Pennsylvania, from 1895 to 2022, from NOAA's Climate at a Glance.
Weather or climate? Weather is what the atmosphere does over minutes to months — the rain or sun outside right now. Climate is the pattern expected from 30 years or more. Put simply: climate is what you expect (a hot summer), weather is what you get (a warm, rainy day).
2022 at a glance
The year was slightly warmer and wetter than average: the 38th warmest and 41st wettest since records began in 1895.
Temperature
Every season was near or just above normal. Nine months were warmer than average, and February, March, May and November were at least 2.0°F above their long-term means.
| Month | Average (°F) | Departure from 1895–2021 average (°F) |
|---|---|---|
| January | 21.9 | −3.1 |
| February | 28.9 | +2.4 |
| March | 38.5 | +3.1 |
| April | 45.6 | −0.5 |
| May | 58.6 | +2.0 |
| June | 65.3 | +0.8 |
| July | 69.6 | +1.3 |
| August | 68.0 | +1.4 |
| September | 60.8 | +0.4 |
| October | 47.1 | −2.4 |
| November | 40.7 | +2.2 |
| December | 28.8 | +0.1 |
| 2022 | 47.8 | +0.6 |
Figure 1. 2022 temperature rankings by season and for the year, Somerset County. An arrow at the top would mark the warmest on record since 1895, at the bottom the coldest. Winter = January–March, spring = April–June, summer = July–September, autumn = October–December. NPS.
Precipitation
Precipitation was just above normal, with no season extremely wet or dry. The year's total was 46.89 inches, 2.63 inches above the long-term average.
| Month | Total (in.) | Departure from 1895–2021 average (in.) |
|---|---|---|
| January | 3.73 | +0.25 |
| February | 4.29 | +1.34 |
| March | 2.20 | −1.73 |
| April | 4.24 | +0.46 |
| May | 5.83 | +1.57 |
| June | 3.57 | −1.00 |
| July | 4.46 | +0.13 |
| August | 4.52 | +0.49 |
| September | 3.91 | +0.41 |
| October | 2.42 | −0.70 |
| November | 4.30 | +1.29 |
| December | 3.42 | +0.11 |
| 2022 | 46.89 | +2.63 |
Figure 2. 2022 precipitation rankings by season and for the year, Somerset County. An arrow at the top would mark the wettest on record since 1895, at the bottom the driest. NPS.
The long view
Since 1895, Somerset County's annual average temperature has risen about 0.1°F per decade, and annual precipitation about 0.43 inches per decade.
Figure 3. Annual average temperature (°F) and total precipitation (in.), Somerset County, 1895–2022; dashed lines show the linear trends. NPS.
Looking ahead: Park Service scientists' models project that by 2100 the park's annual average temperature will rise by 3.1–9.2°F (best to worst case), and annual precipitation by 6–12% (Gonzalez and others, 2018).
Rapid climate change challenges parks in new ways — wildlife migrations shift, more destructive storms threaten cultural resources and facilities, habitat is disrupted. More: the NPS climate change site.
Sources
Based on "2022 Weather in Review: Flight 93 National Memorial," Eastern Rivers and Mountains Network, National Park Service; a work of the United States government in the public domain. Data: NOAA's NClimDiv dataset (v1.0.0-20230106). The article's text gives the year's precipitation as 48.89 inches, 2.6 above average; its table, used here, gives 46.89 and +2.63.
In these publicationsFlight 93 National Memorial
Licence: CC0 1.0 (public domain) · Adapted from www.nps.gov
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