Sheridan Area Experiences Hottest September On Record

September is normally the start of both the fall season and cooler temperatures, but last month, not only did the thermometer tell a much different story, it’s now on top of the record books.

The National Weather Service Office in Billings, Montana, says the average temperature for the Sheridan area in September 2024 was 66.2 degrees Fahrenheit, making it the hottest September on record, since the Service started keeping records back in 1907.

That temperature is 7.1 degrees warmer than normal for this time of year and beats the old September record of 65.3 degrees that was set back in 1963.

Five daily high temperature records were broken last month and the highest temperature recorded for September was 102 degrees on Wednesday the 25th, making it the latest day in the calendar year that a high temperature of 100 degrees or higher has been recorded.

Brian Tesar with the National Weather Service explains what happened and why in some ways it was normal and in other ways it wasn’t.

“We had a high pressure ridge over the whole region. That pattern tends to bring up a lot of warm air from the desert southwest as well. We tend to get high pressure in September. This was unusual that it was very strong for a good part of the month and we never really got anything that changed the pattern for any length of time. Just a few cold fronts here and there that didn’t really change the overall pattern at all.”

Tesar adds he does not foresee much change in the current weather pattern for at least the next 7 days.