Temperature records crashed all over the area, thanks to a heat wave that dominated the weather in August, sending heat indexes well into the triple digits, according to the National Weather Service in Ruskin.
It was the hottest August on record in Lakeland, the second hottest in Winter Haven and the third hottest in Bartow. It was the warmest summer on record in Lakeland, but the eighth and sixth warmest summer in Winter Haven and Bartow respectively, but in Winter Haven the ranking was less than 1 degree F.
Except for a hot spell in 1941, most of the local high temperatures around here have occurred in the past decade or so.
A lot of residents probably got a reminder of how hot it was last month when they got their latest electric bill.
Rainfall, would probably have been really scant except for the passage of Hurricane Idalia offshore, didn’t even make the top 20 wettest Augusts.
It was enough to restore anemic flow in the Upper Peace River to around average flow for this time of year. Before the storm there was not enough water in the river to take a canoe trip that would not have involved some portaging.