Wet, hot, American summer in North Idaho

KELLOGG— The joke about the weather in Northern Idaho goes, “wait around five minutes, and it will change.”

Locals taking part in Fourth of July Events this weekend witnessed it for themselves as the weekend had sunny days one moment, and torrential rain the next.

Shoshone County residents were able to enjoy a thunderstorm or two, sometimes being unable to discern thunder from the booms of their neighbors lighting fireworks.

Temperatures also waxed to near extreme levels with Saturday, July 1 clocking in at a high of 91°, while Monday’s Fourth of July cooled down substantially along with some heavy rain and a high temperature of 64°.

For reference, according to the National Weather Service, the Hottest Fourth of July that scorched the Northern Panhandle was 99 degrees in the year 1970, the coldest temperature recorded was from 1902 and came in at a cool 55 °F, with the wettest Independence Day having a precipitation level of 0.77” in 1902.

Ten years ago, in 2012, the Farmers Almanac reported that the temperature was around 60 degrees, with total precipitation at 0.06 inches, with twenty years ago in 2002 reporting no precipitation and a high temperature of 57 degrees.

Extreme Weather Watch reports that the typical July weather for Kellogg is an average daily high of 84° and an average daily low of 52.4° with a monthly precipitation of 1.0 inches.

The Highest Temperature ever recorded in Kellogg in July was a whopping 109° on July 28, 1934, and the lowest temperature coming in at a cool 31° on July 20, 1969. The most monthly precipitation in the month of July took place in 1993 with a recorded 4.6 inches of precipitation.