June Weather Recap: Active Start to the Summer

If you had the feeling the start of the summer season has been busy from a weather standpoint, you'd be correct. NOAA and Climate.gov have released their summary for June including major weather events and additions to the Billion Dollar Disasters.

In June, 4 new Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters were added to 2024, bringing the year-to-date total to 15 disasters. According to NOAA, the four confirmed billion-dollar disasters "include[e] two hail events that impacted Texas and Colorado at the end of April and end of May, respectively, one severe weather event that impacted the central, southern, and eastern U.S. in mid-May and a tornado outbreak that impacted portions of the Central U.S. in mid-May. 

Additional possible billion-dollar disasters from June and July are as follows:

• Central Severe Weather: Hail storms, high wind and tornadoes impact several central states on June 12-13.

• High Plains and Midwest Flooding in Iowa, Minnesota and South Dakota

• Hurricane Beryl in late June and early July. Beryl became the earliest Category 5 storm ever on record and the first Category 4 hurricane in the Atlantic Basin ever in June.

The month of June was also extremely toasty with an average temperature in the lower 48 of 71.8°F, 3.4°F above average. This makes June 2024 the second warmest June in 130 years of record keeping. There were heat waves in the Southwest, Great Lakes, and Northeast.

Other notable weather events during June included the deadly South Fork Fire that forced the evacuation of the entire town of Ruidoso, NM, and claimed two lives. The fire was started by lightning. Tropical storm Alberto impacted far south Texas and northern Mexico with heavy rainfall, storm surge and damaging winds. According to NOAA, "Some Texas communities saw nearly three times their June average for rainfall over 48 hours from Tropical Storm Alberto, including the Gulf Coast-area city of Rockport, Texas, which received 9.97 inches of rain from the storm; its June average is 3.66 inches. Similarly, Alice, Texas, received 6.57 inches of rain—nearly triple its June average of 2.32 inches."

The Lone Star State had its fair share of busy weather in June; early in the month huge hail struck the state. On June 2nd a hailstone over 6.25 inches in diameter hit the Texas Panhandle — this could be the new state record for largest hail diameter.