Dry weather to continue for rest of August

Today Online 16 Aug 16;

SINGAPORE — The island will continue to face dry weather conditions in the next two weeks, and daily maximum temperatures could reach between 32°C and 33°C on most days, and hit 34°C on a few days.

Short-duration thundery showers can also be expected on three or five days in the next fortnight, mostly in the late morning and early afternoon. Thundery showers with gusty winds due to Sumatra squalls may occur in the morning on one or two days, the Meteorological Service Singapore (MSS) said in its fortnightly outlook on Tuesday (Aug 16).

Due to the dry weather conditions the island has been experiencing in recent weeks, rainfall for this month is likely to be “significantly below normal”.

The total rainfall recorded for the first half of this month was 41.2mm, about 72 per cent below the long-term mean of 148.9mm for August.

According to the MSS, the past two weeks saw Singapore experiencing a few warm days, and the highest daily maximum temperature was 35.4°C, which was recorded on Aug 10 in the northern part of the island.

The mean monthly temperature recorded during this period was 28.9°C, about 1°C warmer than the long-term August mean temperature.

Despite the dry weather conditions in the past fortnight, there was some respite in the form of thundery showers, which affected a few areas on some days, mainly in the late morning and early afternoon. The heaviest rain fell over the Choa Chu Kang area on Aug 11, where a total of 65.6mm of rainfall was recorded. Earlier on Aug 3, a Sumatra squall that moved across Singapore in the pre-dawn hours brought strong gusts of wind of up to 86.1kmh around the West Coast areas.

In the first half of this month, the highest rainfall of 56mm — 39 per cent below average — was recorded around Serangoon. Rainfall was lowest around Jurong West where 4mm, or 95 per cent below average, was recorded, the MSS added.