Michigan-based meteorologist Mark Torregrossa, writing for MLive, updated locals about an unprecedented condition in Lake Michigan’s water temperature and what it could mean for the coming winter.
What’s happening?
Lake Michigan is the third-largest lake in the United States, spanning four states — Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin — and 22,300 square miles.
According to Torregrossa, Lake Michigan water temperature tracking as it occurs today began back in 1995, when weather data-gathering satellites first began monitoring the Great Lakes’ surface temperatures on a daily basis.
As such, meteorologists have three decades of day-to-day data from which to draw and contrast with current conditions. On Oct. 9, Lake Michigan’s water temperatures were the highest they’d ever been on that date since modern tracking started…