Las Vegas Valley expected to have one of hottest years

Monday, Dec. 20, 2004 | 8:54 a.m.

Preliminary information indicates that 2004 may be the fourth-hottest year on record in the Las Vegas Valley, National Weather Service forecasters said.

Even with cooler temperatures predicted for this week, it's still a hot one.

"It's a rough guess," weather service meteorologist Brian Fuis said, since there are 11 more days left in the year.

Southern Nevada is warming up in general as more pavement and concrete cover the desert valley as population growth continues, Fuis said.

Even with high temperatures expected to range in the 50s this week, the year is still expected to rank as one of the hottest.

"This year is definitely going to be in the top 10," forecaster Andy Gorelow said. The hottest year was 2003 with an average of 70.0 degrees Fahrenheit. So far this year, the annual average is 69.4 degrees Fahrenheit.

The month of March topped all-time records kept for the valley since 1934, Gorelow said.

"The month of March shattered the record," Gorelow said, which was 63.7 degrees for that month in 1972. This year the temperature was 66.5 degrees.

Nevada climatologist Jeff Underwood is still working on the state's annual climate report, but July in Las Vegas was very warm, within one degree Fahrenheit off the record for the month set in 2003. Last year the record was 94.8 degrees Fahrenheit.

Although the Southwest received rain and there has been snow in the Sierra Nevadas and the Rocky Mountains, Southern Nevada is still in severe drought as of December, Underwood said.

"And there are abnormally dry conditions across most of the Colorado Basin," Underwood said in an e-mail.

Nevada's reservoirs are still "well below capacity," and the rest of the winter will need to deliver plenty of snow for fuller water basins by the late spring and early summer, Underwood said.

While Utah has received above normal snows, Colorado is 10 percent to 25 percent below normal for the winter so far.

For those who thought it was hot in Southern Nevada this year, the entire globe was warmer and next year's forecast is for even hotter temperatures.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in an unusual move Thursday, released a preliminary analysis for the year ending Dec. 31. Normally the report arrives in the last week in December.

Global mean surface temperature over land and sea was 0.55 degrees Fahrenheit, higher than the long-term mean for 1880 to 2003. That makes it the fourth-warmest year since 1880 when reliable instruments began recording temperatures.