Wisconsin Breaks 5-Year Precipitation Record In 2013-2017

Wisconsin is getting wetter. The state has had its wettest five-year and 10-year periods in the past decade.

Data from the National Centers for Environmental Information shows the year 2013 through 2017 beat the previous five-year record with a total of 186.46 inches of precipitation. That five-year period beat the previous record from 1982 through 1986 by more than 8 inches.

Bryan Peake, a climatologist with the Midwestern Regional Climate Center, said that a single, record-breaking five-year period would be considered an outlier because there can be a lot of variability in such a short period of time.

But between 2008 and 2017, Wisconsin broke its 10-year precipitation record, too. Peake said the same is happening in Minnesota and Michigan.

“Both of those states also had their wettest five-year period on record from 2013 to 2017,” he said. “So, it’s something that’s happened over the entire part of that upper Midwest.”

Peake said the data shows the extremes aren’t localized and that there’s a waviness in weather patterns.

He said natural and man-made factors could be adding to the extreme variability in climate.

“Is the changing of the climate due to something anthropogenic causing some of the more natural variability to become more variable? That’s something that seems to be showing up more often in the past 10 to 20 years,” Peake said.

Steve Vavrus, a senior scientist with the Nelson Institute Center for Climatic Research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the earth’s warming surface increases evaporation of the planet’s oceans, lakes and soil. The added moisture in the atmosphere leads to an more rainfall.