LA GRANDE — Last year’s scorching hot temperatures and lack of precipitation took a heavy toll on the area, but thankfully this year spring and the beginning of summer have been much more pleasant.

Eastern Oregon has yet to reach 90 degrees this year with the last triple-digit day coming on Aug. 3, 2021, in Union County when it hit 101 and Aug. 15, 2021, in Wallowa County when it hit 101 as well, according to forecasters with the National Weather Service office in Pendleton. The final triple digit days last August came on the heels of an incredibly hot summer, highlighted by one of the most historic and unprecedented heat waves the area has ever experienced.

“Last year we had the heat wave at the end of June that was out of the ordinary,” Larry Nierenberg, a senior forecaster for the National Weather Service, said. “That was a record for a heat wave across the Northwest.”

During the height of the heat wave in 2021, La Grande broke five consecutive daily record highs, from June 28 to July 2, and ultimately tied the daily record on July 3. For La Grande, the hottest temperature recorded was 108 degrees on June 30 and July 1. The reading of 108 degrees also broke the record for the highest monthly temperature recorded in June and tied the monthly record high for July originally set in 2002.

Additionally, the 108-degree mark tied the record for the all-time maximum temperature originally recorded in 2002.

“Last year was a bump away from the normal patterns,” Ann Adams, a National Weather Service assistant forecaster, said. “We had a larger, stronger, dry-air mass over the Northwest and it stayed put last year. It persisted over our area and heated up the entire West. We just happened to be under the deepest part of that ridge.”

Weather that warm is not expected in the area in the near future, but temperatures are definitely going to be on the increase.

“It looks like later this week, it will warm up,” Nierenberg said on Tuesday, June 21. “The 8-14-day outlook is calling for above normal temperatures and below normal precipitation into the last part of June, first part of July. I would think La Grande would probably hit 90 at some point in the next couple of weeks.”

There is still time to set a new record for the latest day on the calendar that the first 90 degree day comes to Wallowa or Union counties. In Wallowa County, the latest occurrence is July 30, 1907. Union County’s is far more recent — July 24, 2011.

It also looks like the region will begin to dry out from what was an abnormally wet spring. The National Integrated Drought Information System said May was the sixth wettest on record in Union County since records started being kept 128 years ago.

The National Weather Service, who partners with cooperative observers like the Oregon Department of Forestry to measure rain levels, reported 5.44 inches of rainfall in La Grande during May, which was 2.28 inches wetter than normal.

The wet spring and cool temperatures have helped keep wildfires at bay — for now.

“We’ve been relatively wet, so that’s going to put it off,” Nierenberg said of fire season. “These warmer temperatures are going to help us dry out, so we are still, I would think, probably by mid to late July, going to start having fire problems.”