The 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 Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site, using county-level data averaged over Blair and Cambria counties, Pennsylvania, from 1895 to 2022, courtesy of NOAA's Climate at a Glance program.
The skew arch bridge. NPS/Victoria Stauffenberg
Weather is what the atmosphere is doing over minutes to months — the rain or sun outside right now. Climate is what you expect from patterns over 30 years or more. Climate is what you expect, like a hot summer; weather is what you get, like a warm, rainy day.
2022 at a glance
| Temperature | 39th warmest year on record (since 1895), averaging 48.5 °F — 0.6 °F above the long-term average |
| Precipitation | 32nd wettest: 45.30 inches, 3.38 inches above average |
Temperature
The spring was especially warm. Eight months were warmer than normal, and February, March and November were each more than 2 °F above their averages.
Seasonal and annual temperature rankings; the top of the scale is the warmest on record. Winter = Jan–Mar, spring = Apr–Jun, summer = Jul–Sep, autumn = Oct–Dec. NPS
| Month | Average (°F) | Versus 1895–2021 average |
|---|---|---|
| January | 21.9 | −3.3 |
| February | 29.2 | +2.6 |
| March | 38.9 | +3.2 |
| April | 45.5 | −1.1 |
| May | 59.4 | +1.9 |
| June | 67.0 | +1.4 |
| July | 71.0 | +1.3 |
| August | 69.5 | +1.6 |
| September | 61.8 | +0.4 |
| October | 48.1 | −2.2 |
| November | 41.4 | +2.2 |
| December | 29.1 | −0.2 |
| 2022 | 48.5 | +0.6 |
Precipitation
Most seasons were wetter than normal.
Seasonal and annual precipitation rankings; the top of the scale is the wettest on record. NPS
| Month | Total (in.) | Versus 1895–2021 average |
|---|---|---|
| January | 2.64 | −0.43 |
| February | 5.00 | +2.37 |
| March | 2.50 | −1.12 |
| April | 3.73 | +0.12 |
| May | 5.78 | +1.67 |
| June | 4.17 | −0.14 |
| July | 3.50 | −0.69 |
| August | 4.69 | +1.00 |
| September | 4.05 | +0.51 |
| October | 1.90 | −1.22 |
| November | 4.30 | +1.29 |
| December | 3.06 | +0.02 |
| 2022 | 45.30 | +3.38 |
Long-term trends
Since 1895, the counties' annual average temperature has risen about 0.1 °F per decade, and annual precipitation has also increased.
Annual average temperature and total precipitation, 1895–2022; dashed lines show the linear trends. NPS
Park Service scientists project that by 2100, the park's annual average temperature will rise 3.2–9.4 °F (best to worst case), and annual precipitation 6%–12% (Gonzalez and others, 2018).
Rapid climate change is challenging parks as never before — shifting wildlife migrations, more destructive storms threatening cultural resources and facilities, disrupted habitat. See the NPS climate change site for what's happening, what the Park Service is doing, and how you can help.
Sources
Based on "2022 Weather in Review: Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site," Eastern Rivers and Mountains Network, National Park Service; a work of the United States government in the public domain. Data from NOAA's NClimDiv dataset (version v1.0.0-20230106). The article gives the precipitation trend as 0.47 inches per decade in one place and 0.46 in another, so no figure is given here.
In these publicationsAllegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site
Licence: CC0 1.0 (public domain) · Adapted from www.nps.gov
1
0
0
0
Comments
