All-time U.S. precipitation records in 2018 – Five states and 24 cities had wettest year on record

Desdemona Despair

By Bob Henson
3 January 2018

(Weather Underground) – In a post on December 29, we noted a number of U.S. cities that had already secured their wettest year on record. Now that 2018 is a wrap, it’s time to circle back and see how the final totals turned out.

Here are some of the larger towns and cities that notched records for 2018, as tallied by weather.com based on data from NOAA and the Southeastern Regional Climate Center. All of these locations have at least a 60-year period of record, and some of the records broken were truly long-standing, including Washington, D.C. (129 years) and Wilmington, North Carolina (141 years). Many of the records were smashed by impressive margins of 5″ or more.

See the weather.com article for additional background on this very wet year.Location and total rainfall in 2018 (old annual record, year)

Washington, DC (DCA):  66.28” (61.33”, 1889)
Mason City, IA:  54.74” (47.75”, 2016)
Waterloo, IA:  54.05” (53.07”, 1993)
Lexington, KY:  71.98” (66.35”, 2011)
Louisville, KY:  68.83” (68.02”, 2011)
Baltimore, MD (BWI):  71.82” (62.66”, 2003)
Asheville, NC:  79.48” (75.22”, 2013)
Elizabeth City, NC:  63.95” (62.13”, 1979)
Greensboro, NC:  64.11” (62.32”, 2003)
New Bern, NC:  79.17” (72.70”, 2003)
Wilmington, NC:  102.40” (83.65”, 1877)
Atlantic City, NJ:  68.57” (66.38”, 1958)
Elmira, NY:  57.62” (49.96”, 2011)
Columbus, OH:  55.18” (54.96”, 2011)
Pittsburgh, PA:  57.83” (57.41”, 2004)
Scranton, PA:  61.08” (59.99”, 2011)
State College, PA:  63.76” (59.30”, 1996)
Sioux Falls, SD:  39.19” (38.26”, 2010)
Danville, VA:  67.61” (62.78”, 2003)
Lynchburg, VA:  65.70” (59.71”, 1972)
Roanoke, VA:  62.45” (58.81”, 2003)
Green Bay, WI:  39.21” (38.36”, 1985)
Charleston, WV:  67.05” (61.01”, 2003)
Wheeling, WV:  57.65” (50.79”, 1950)

If we expand the roster of observing sites to include those with shorter periods of record, then more than 100 U.S. locations had their wettest year on record, according to The Weather Channel. [more]

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