Long Island weather: Temperature hits record high 61 degrees

Milania Matos, 2, of Bethpage, enjoys an unseasonably warm Thursday afternoon at Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Park in Oyster Bay, Dec. 10, 2015. Credit: Danielle Finkelstein
“Super warm outside this morning,” is how Rich Hoffman, News 12 Long Island meteorologist, put it.
You could also say super warm in the early afternoon when Long Island MacArthur Airport in Ronkonkoma saw 61 degrees at 12:29 p.m., the National Weather Service said, surpassing the record of 58, set in 2012.
And Thursday is just one of a string of above-normal days into next week, with daily record highs possible at least through Monday, Hoffman said.
This almost balmy weather is a continuation of mild temperatures the first nine days of the month, which registered an average of 5.6 degrees above normal. And that comes on the heels of a record-warm fall.
That’s as the polar jet stream has stayed well to the north, with the subtropical jet stream blowing warmer air up from the southwest, said Jessica Spaccio earlier this month. Spaccio is a climatologist with the Northeast Regional Climate Center, based at Cornell University.
The outlook for winter overall shows a likelihood for Long Island to see mild but wet conditions, according to the Climate Prediction Center.
Wet could be a help, as the area is in need of precipitation with the Island remaining since May in moderate drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.
The precipitation deficit at MacArthur Airport is 9.88 inches, Hoffman said.
Thursday’s higher-than-normal temperatures are expected to stick around through the weekend, until a cold front approaches on Monday, the weather service’s Upton office said.
Temperatures before sunrise Thursday were in the low 50s; normal daily lows for this time of year are about 29 degrees, Hoffman said.
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