You’re not imagining things. It really has been hotter than usual in Miami

If you think it’s been hotter in Miami for the past month or so, you haven’t been imagining things.

It has been hotter.

Not record-setting, iguana-broiling, relax in a nice cool bath hot, but steamy enough to ruin your evening café dining outside on Lincoln Road or the Gables’ open-air Giralda Plaza.

Chris Fisher, meteorologist for the National Weather Service, confirmed Tuesday afternoon what we’ve been saying to one another for weeks:

“We have been a little warmer than normal,” he said. “For the month of September, Miami did run slightly above normal — only about a half degree. But if you look at the past week we’ve been looking at temperatures above average at 2 to 3 degrees above normal for this time of year.”

We should be at about 82 degrees on average by Oct. 1. “We’ve been running 84 to 85 degrees,” Fisher said.

So will this week bring cool relief?

Maybe a little.

“Nothing significant,” Fisher said.

“We will get a little relief as far as high temperatures — mainly in the mid to upper 80s over the next week. We won’t see as many lower 90s that we saw last week. But the low at night will still be fairly warm — upper 70s to 80s, and that’s where people notice it, at night.”

Don’t blame the messenger. There are several reasons for the sweaty nights, Fisher explained.

“One: We’ve been in a persistent easterly flow, pulling in a lot of moisture off the ocean,” he said. “And so that’s been part of what is keeping temperatures up at night.

“And, overall, we’ve been fairly dry this past week without having those daily rain showers to cool you down a little bit,” Fisher said. “This has allowed the temperatures to stay fairly warm.”

As for this first week of October in South Florida, “strong high pressure to the north of the region will keep [the] brisk east flow in place for most of this week,” the National Weather Service’s Miami office forecasts.

What this means is a pattern of quick moving, isolated to scattered thunderstorms through the week in the afternoons — with Thursday seeing the most action as a tropical wave passes through. Lightning will be the primary threat

And those rip currents that have led to beach alerts since the weekend? Those are continuing this week, according to the service..

Highs will be 85 degrees every day — except for Friday. That day, before your weekend starts, will be 86.

So much for relief.

This story was originally published October 2, 2018 at 6:23 PM.