Warm Weather Feature

September heat wave sizzles Syracuse

Local high temperature records were broken this week but will be cooling off as soon as tomorrow.

Syracuse in late September, a once picturesque fall setting, has recently experienced a heatwave with temperatures that have not been seen in over a century.

While warm weather is scarce in Syracuse especially once fall rolls around, the recent heatwave has upended some students’ expectations for the season.

“I definitely wasn’t expecting it coming into Syracuse," forensic science freshman Kyla Reitzel. "I also don’t like how we don’t have AC."

Photo: Connor Fogel
Political science freshman Kendra Cross reads her writing class textbook on the newly-redone Hendricks Chapel stairs.

Other students have stronger feelings on the unseasonably warm weather.

“I hate it,” says Lauren Steckley a sophomore magazine major. “I’m not a fan of super-hot weather, which is part of the reason I chose SU. I’m like ‘it’s almost October, please tone it down'."

If the reactions appear strong, it might be because of how unprecedented this heatwave is. To find the most recent hot spell in late Sept. you’d have to look back 88 years ago to a six-day span of 80 degrees or more from Sept. 22-27. The current streak of heat is projected to hit 12 days over 80 degrees, according to forecasts for Sept. 27.

Temperatures around 10 degrees above historical averages have occurred consistently since Sept. 13, but only in the last week have record setting temperatures become the norm. From Sept. 23-25, Syracuse heated up within a few degrees of record highs for those dates.

On Sept. 26, a high of 91 degrees scorched past the previous record of 88 set in 1934. Wednesday is projected to be the hottest Sept. 27 since 1929. The previous record was 83 degrees while the forecast calls for Wednesday’s high to reach up to 90 degrees.

While the warm weather might have been a welcome change, the heatwave has outlasted students’ patience and they say they are eager to usher in a Central New York autumn.

“I love the warm weather,” advertising senior Kevin Pacelli said. “But once I accepted the fact that fall was coming I was really ready for it to get here already.”

Pacelli and the rest of Syracuse University won’t have to wait much longer. Sept. 28's forecast is 65 degrees and partly cloudy, a full two degrees under the average high.


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