June weather in March – What unusual temperatures the weekend heat wave brought to Romania

​The last two days of March brought record temperatures especially in Transylvania, there were also maximums of 30 ºC, but also a “tropical night” typical of summer. In some places the temperatures were those recorded in the second part of June and were 25 ºC even at the “pole of cold”. Why is this heat wave unusual? Where were records broken 49 years ago?

Temperatures that should have occurred in June

There were heat waves in February, and March “kept” not leaving us without a few record days. The “stars” were the weather stations in cities such as Călărași, Giurgiu or Oravița. There were also places in Transylvania and Moldova where the temperatures were at the level of those that would be recorded in the second part of June.

On Thursday, the weather began to heat up seriously, and the maximum in the country was +23 C in Bechet. The little summer was just beginning.

On Friday, the temperatures rose, they exceeded 20 ºC in all regions and were above 25 C in Moldova, Oltenia and Muntenia. The warmest was in Brăila and Calafat (+25.8 C), in Buzău it was 25.6 C, in Ploiești 25.5 C, and in Focșani, +25.2 C, according to ANM maps.

Saturday was an exceptional day, with maximums across the country that reached +29.8 ºC in Giurgiu, +28.8 ºC in Zimnicea and +28.6 C in Călărași. There were absolute records for March in several places, such as Târgu Mureș (+27.1 C, breaking a record from 1975).

Even at Intorsura Buzăului they were 24.7 ºC, and at Miercurea Ciuc, one tenth of a degree less. In Lugoj it was +28.5 C, and in Sebeș and Dumbrăveni, in Transylvania, it was 27.8 C. The warmest in Moldova was in Botoșani, 27.1 C. The coldest in the country in the inhabited areas of been to Sulina: only +12.6 C.

And the end of the day was exceptional: at 11 pm it was +23 C in Moldova Nouă and Oravița, like a summer evening.

Ride and the 30 degrees

The morning of Sunday, March 31, brought temperatures between -1.2 ºC in Miercurea Ciuc and +20.2 C in Oravița. The latter is an exceptional temperature, because the city of Banat experienced a tropical night at the end of March.

Tropical nights are those in which the minimum does not fall below 20 ºC and they occur mostly from June to August, but not at high altitudes. A few times a century there are tropical nights at the end of April in Oravița and Drobeta Turnu Severin, but such a temperature appearing in March is very rare. Normally the night minimum is somewhere around 6-7 C in Oravița.

In Oravița, on Sunday, the maximum was +26.5 C, and towards the end of the day, around 11 p.m., it was still very hot: +23 C.

On Sunday at noon, temperatures were 11-15 C higher than normal for the period, the maximum in the country being 30 ºC, in Călărași, a city that holds many heat records for spring and autumn. The coldest was in Sulina: +12.2 ºC at noon.

In Oltenita it was 29.5 C, in Zimnicea it was 29.3 C, and in Moldova Veche, 29.2 C. Over 29 C were also in Adamclisi. In Transylvania, it was 28 C in Blaj and +27.7 C in Alba Iulia. In Moldova there were +27.7 C in Roman, according to ANM data. In Iași, it was +27.9 C, surpassing the record for March, which dates back to 1975.

There were June temperatures in many places where it is normally cool in March: +27.5 ºC in Rădăuți, +27.4 C in Suceava, +27.6 C in Târgu Secuiesc, +24.6 C in Toplița and +23.5 C in Joseni.

High summer temperatures were recorded at two weather stations from two famous “poles of cold”: they were +26.5 C at Intorsura Buzăului and +25.7 C at Miercurea Ciuc.

At the end of Sunday, at 11 p.m., the ANM data showed temperatures that would not have been exaggerated even in July: they were +23 C in several places in the west and there were 21 C in Sibiu and Blaj and 20 C in Brașov.