South Florida saw an “unusually” hot summer with below-average rainfall, according to the National Weather Service, with several areas experiencing some of their driest summers on record.
“Relatively low rainfall values placed many sites among the top 10 driest summer seasons on record, and came at the heels of a dry spring,” read a Sept. 1 weather summary by the National Weather Service Forecast Office Miami-South Florida.
Several areas also broke established heat records, according to the NWS, with Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach experiencing their hottest summers on record, along with the whole of the United States. Records in both cities both go back “well over 100 years.” Miami tied 2023 for its hottest summer.
Which areas saw especially dry summers
Many official reporting sites saw summers within their top 10 driest on record, according to the NWS.
For instance, Homestead General Airport saw its 10th driest summer, NWS Miami-FIU saw its third driest summer, Opa-Locka Airport saw its 10th driest summer, Miami International Airport saw its eighth driest summer and Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport saw its eighth driest summer.
Dry summer prolonged drought, provoked fires
Although the document doesn’t point to a “single weather feature” as the cause of the dry heat, the region “experienced trends similar to those observed over much of the Caribbean region,” which is “a common feature during El Niño episodes in the summer.”
“This prevented prolonged periods of tropical moisture from affecting South Florida for long periods of time,” the summary added.
Drought persisted for longer, with “conditions which normally end in June,” including extreme drought, which lingered in the “southern Everglades” through the end of the summer. The dry summer also resulted in “several lightning-triggered wildfires,” which lasted from a week to nearly a month.
The U.S. saw its hottest summer on record
The contiguous U.S. just saw its warmest summer on record, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The average temperature for meteorological summer in 2026, which lasts from June through August, was the warmest in the 132-year record, exceeding records set in 1936 and 2021 by 0.4 degrees.
Records date back to 1895, according to NOAA.
Sarah Perkel is a South Florida Connect Reporter for the USA TODAY Network’s Florida Connect team. You can get all of Florida’s best content directly in your inbox each weekday day by signing up for the free newsletter, Florida TODAY.