Extreme Temperatures
"It wasn't clear if it was going to be a hot or a cool summer," said National Weather Service meteorologist David Stark. "We started out the year very cool and it seems like we just continued that. It doesn't look like we have any heat waves in the near future."
Instead of searching for the skimpiest outfits to battle the sizzling sun, New Yorkers are reaching for their sweatshirts.
"It's been so much colder this summer," said Susan Vartholomatos, 51, who broke out her bikini for a beach day Friday afternoon. "In the morning, when I go out to my terrace, I need a sweatshirt."
Vartholomatos said she wishes it was hotter, adding "I'd take heat and humidity over snow any day."
Only four days have hit 90 degrees this summer, three in July and one in August, with the hottest temperature on the books clocking in at 91.

Golf ball-sized hail struck suddenly in Airdrie, north of Calgary, Thursday afternoon.
Airdrie hail storm likely caused 'gustnado' in Calgary, officials say
Environment Canada says incident was not a tornado but rather a spout from an Airdrie storm
It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a - "gustnado?"While police say they did receive several reports of a tornado touching down east of Métis Trail and north of Stoney Trail, Environment Canada says the incident was rather a gustnado, or spout from a nearby storm system battering Airdrie.
The weather agency says the storm system was not over Calgary at the time of the incident and the spiral winds likely came from the nearby storm.Det. Dale Seddon with the Calgary Police Service says the incident didn't cause any damage and hit a grassy area.
Here we have almost fifty photos of the hailstorm's aftermath and the posts from the discussions boards. Here is one:
"Those are Americans testing meteorological weapons. Soon you'll see this in Moscow. Every day." - said one person.
"They have disturbed an ancient mummy in Altai, maybe they should put it back", says another. They really did.
It was also the coldest day Adelaide has experienced in any month in six years. Senior forecaster Mark Anolak said the low temperature has been brought on by cold air from the Antarctic moving over Adelaide.
"Under a ridge of high pressure that we are experiencing at the moment, clear skies have led to very cold temperatures over the last couple of days," he said.
"Murray Bridge has had its coldest ever start to the day in August at -2.7 degrees this morning."
Most of regional South Australia woke to cold and frosty conditions. The weather bureau said it got down to -5.6C in Renmark, just above freezing in Lameroo and -3.9C in Loxton. Clear, sunny skies lifted the temperature as the morning went on.
A bufflehead was reported on Pleasant Lake in New London on July 25.
It's a small duck, rarely seen in the state, whose normal range is in the Arctic and Canada.
The males are mostly white with a black puffy head, while the female is dark with a white spot behind the eye.
Rest of report here.
But the hail storm that happened Friday evening was like nothing many had ever seen before.
The CBS 58 Newsroom received several calls from viewers in shock.
CBS 58 viewer Joe James became a reporter of sorts and started rolling video and narrating the amazing sight outside his car window as he drove along Racine Avenue between Waukesha and Muskego.
"It was just 90 degrees earlier today," he declared. "Amazing hail storm."
Others in Ozaukee County said drivers pulled alongside the road they were so startled by the pounding of the hail stones.
Another resident in New Berlin said the hail had done major damage to her backyard, bringing down tree limbs everywhere she looked.
"You guys should be out here," she urged. "This is a big deal."
See for yourself.
In his eighty years, Nicholas Legott had never seen a hailstorm in Geneva like he saw Thursday morning. He certainly did not expect to be shoveling hail out of his driveway.
Legott said, "The force of the hail hitting the house. It wasn't just that. It was coming down in buckets. It was unbelievable."
Just Wednesday, Legott and his family were ecstatic about how well their new garden of organic tomatoes and peppers were doing. Now, they are a shredded, icy mess.
Although there were reports that Wednesday's temperature also set the record for the all-time low in July, National Weather Service meteorologist Michael Garrison said while it was the coolest temperature Montgomery had experienced in July, it didn't break the record.
"The temperature tied it, but it didn't break it," said the Birmingham meteorologist, adding that the previous all-time record was a low of 59 degrees that Montgomery experienced on July 20, 2009.
This was the third round of record-setting lows the area has seen this July. But it has still been a hot one.
The cool weather has alternated with some very hot weather, and the result is that so far even with several record-setting lows, as of Wednesday night this was only the 69th coolest July on record, Garrison said.
Temperatures will stay slightly below normal Thursday, putting the monthly average at 70.1 degrees. That's 0.5 degrees cooler than the previous July low of 70.6, set in 1947. Indianapolis has not even topped 90 degrees so far this year.
"The warmest day of 88 degrees (in July) is also the warmest temperature we've had so far this year," said StormTeam 6 meteorologist Todd Klaassen.In an average July, Indianapolis' temperature is 75.4 degrees. The record-low temperatures this July come two years after Indianapolis set a heat record.
In July 2012, the average temperature in Indianapolis was 84.0 degrees, shattering a record set in 1936. July 2011 was also toasty, with the average that month at 82.0 degrees, ranking it as the third-warmest July on record in Indianapolis. July 2009 was another cool month in Indianapolis, with the average temperature of 70.9, chilly enough for third place in the record books.
So far for the USA year to date, the numbers of record lows outpace the highs two to one.
This year, here have been been 12,644 daily record lowest temperatures versus 6,615 record highest temperatures in the USA, a ratio of 1.91 to 1.0.
For all types of high and low daily records for the year to date, there were 29,372 cold records versus 16,761 warm records, a ratio of 1.75 to 1.0
If all high and low daily record types are considered for the last 365 days, cold still outpaces warm. There are 46,712 cold records versus 36,650 warm records.
The ratios for monthly all time records also see cold records outpacing warm ones.
Comment: See also:
The Day the Earth Froze: Younger Dryas Ice Age caused by Storm of Comet Debris
Sott's Comets and Catastrophe Series