Toronto saw a record amount of rainfall this July. One expert explains why

Toronto has seen unprecedented amounts of rain this year and one weather specialist says it’s due to a number of factors, including everything from climate change to bad luck.

David Phillips, senior climatologist with Environment Canada, told CTV News Toronto on Thursday that several stormy weather systems this summer landed in the Toronto area, bringing a record amount of rainfall to the city.

That included one system on July 16 where nearly 100 millimetres of rain fell, resulting in flooding on both the Don Valley Parkway and Lake Shore Boulevard as well as widespread power outages.

 “Sometimes, I hate to say it, it’s just bad luck. The storms just seem to follow a certain track and the track brought it into Toronto,” Phillips said. “It’s almost as if these systems have followed a favourite storm track, and the storm track seems to be sitting right over Toronto area.”

Toronto has seen the wettest July on record. Environment Canada recorded 208 millimetres of rain in the city since the beginning of July – more than half of which fell in the downpour last Tuesday.

The last July rainfall record was set in 2008, with 193 millimetres. Normally, the city sees only 76 millimetres of rain during the month.

“The number of days with rain was not high, but the systems seem to be very loaded with moisture and they dump their loads on Toronto,” Phillips said. “We have had more than one weather system with those big gushy wads of rain when typically we would find one every two years.

“It’s really been the heavy falls of rain that have occurred in July rather than the frequency of it.”

Phillips added that climate change could play a factor in the wet July, but it’s not the reason for the heavy rainfall.

“I think there’s a component of climate change, but it’s not sort of the reason why we’re seeing a wet, wet July. There are other more meteorological factors other than climate change that are creating the kind of soggy July,” he said.

“Just all the forces seem to have come together to produce a very, very wet July.”

He said that the wet weather is not the new normal for the Toronto area, but instead people should expect the unexpected when it comes to weather patterns in the city.

“We’ll have to wait and see what August presents. The models seem to suggest it will be kind of normal, but precipitation outlooks a month ahead are not worth very much,” he said.

“I think the new normal is expect the unexpected. You get this one extreme to the other and that seems to be where we’re headed. I wouldn’t be surprised if next year people complain about how dry it is.”