January saw more rain than normal, but how does it compare to past Januarys?

(WGHP) – “Rain, rain, go away, come again another day” is a song that’s been on repeat for people in the Triad. 

The first round of rainfall was recorded only a few days into the start of the new year and since then, rain has been recorded at the airport each week. 

Now that January is over, let’s talk about how soggy of a month it was. Out of the 31 days in January, 12 days recorded measurable rainfall and three days saw just trace amounts of precipitation. 

When combined, almost half of the month of January was wet while 16 days saw no measurable rainfall. 

With rounds of rainfall each week in January, we ended the month with 4.30 inches. This put us nearly an inch above normal for the month and the year. 

With the rain came the cloud cover, and the majority of the month of January was more cloudy than it was sunny. 

Out of 31 days in January, 18 days were considered mostly cloudy to cloudy. 

While it was a wetter-than-normal January, according to recorded rainfall, the Piedmont Triad has seen at least 13 rainy days and has recorded near- or above-normal rainfall in January since 2019. 

In 2022, 13 days recorded rainfall at PTI airport which resulted in 5.03 inches of rain. While we had more rainy days this year, January 2022 had almost 0.75 inches more rain. Last year saw 14 days of more clouds than sunshine compared to this years 18. 

There were more rainy days in January 2021 than there were this year, however rainfall totals were lower. In 2021, 16 days in January recorded rainfall compared to 15 this year. 

In January 2023, we recorded nearly an inch more than in 2021. Similar to 2022, January 2021 had 14 days of more clouds than sunshine. 

In 2020, there were 14 rainy days in January which accumulated to 4.98 inches of rain. While we had one additional rainy day, monthly rainfall totals were higher by roughly 0.60 inches in 2020. 

January 2020 also had more cloud cover than sunshine throughout the month with 16 mostly cloudy to cloudy days out of 31. 

Four years ago, in January 2019, PTI airport recorded 15 days of rainfall, tying this year’s number of rainy days. Even our rainfall totals were less than a half an inch apart. In January 2019 rainfall totals were 4.01 inches compared to January 2023 where we recorded 4.30 inches of rain. 

A break from the rainfall is in the forecast heading into the first weekend of February which will hopefully allow us to dry out before more rain moves in.

More about what’s expected weather-wise in February for the Triad here.