GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) — 2019 is in the books and it was the wettest year on record in Northeast Wisconsin.
“We’ve had 48.6 inches of rain, which easily makes this the wettest year on record,” Rick Mamrosh with the National Weather Service told WTAQ on Tuesday. “Prior to this, last year was the wettest year on record with 39.2 inches…it’s 50% higher than normal rainfall.”
It wasn’t just rain, it was snow. The area saw 88.3 inches of snow, the 5th highest on record.
“As far as temperatures so, it wasn’t that remarkable. Slightly above normal. We’re like 53rd warmest out of 150 years of records,” Mamrosh said.
As for why we’ve seen precipitation climb? The jury is still out.
“It’s hard to say,” “Some people would chalk it up to climate change, but it’s also possible that it’s just another cycle.”
Mamrosh points to the dust bowl of the 1930s and the wet cycle of late 1880s, where the country saw some of the largest all-time snowfalls. He says it won’t be clear for some time if this weather is part of a larger cycle.
It was also the wettest decade the area has seen in 150 years.
