Following summer of smoke and heat, October will start off pleasantly warm

After a summer that saw abnormally high temperatures, a 47-day dry spell, and a week of hazardous smoky air, early October will be relatively mild but still warmer than normal in Spokane. Expect moderate temperatures with a slow descent .

Saturday saw highs in the upper seventies, about ten degrees above the seasonal norm for early October. With a high of 78, Saturday clocked in five degrees below the record for Oct. 3 of 83 degrees, National Weather Service meteorologist Jennifer Simmons said.

But Friday, that warmth will begin to fade. A weather system will move in, bringing a cooling trend that will pull temperatures down to the lower seventies or upper sixties, closer to the seasonal norm of about 65 degrees, she said.

With a few record-breaking days, Spokane’s summer was not remarkably hot, but a particularly dry period led to fires across the state and a week of air quality so bad it got close to maxing out the scale.

Spokane went 47 days without measurable rain starting in early August and ending in late September. July and August together ranked as the seventh driest two-month period in Spokane’s weather records, which go back to 1881.

But as October wears on, Spokane will have easy days in the 70s and 60s, marked by an especially slow cooling trend, Simmons said.