A heat wave caused some of the highest temperatures for an Aug. 15 the area has seen on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service.
The records are unofficial.
Because the data for Sequim and Port Angeles has not been collected at the same location by professionals, official records cannot be calculated, explained Johnny Burg, National Weather Service meteorologist.
But Port Angeles and Sequim each had unofficial records, he said.
Sequim had the hottest temperature on the Peninsula — 91 degrees — compared with its highest unofficially recorded temperature of 81 degrees in 2007, Burg said.
“I would bet that they unofficially broke a record,” he said.
It was 88 degrees at Port Angeles’ William R. Fairchild International Airport, breaking the unofficial 84-degree record on the same day in 1967.
Port Townsend tied its unofficial record from 2008 with an 85-degree high on Sunday, he said.
The Quillayute Airport weather station just outside of Forks has collected official data for about a century, but Sunday’s temperature of 74 and nowhere near the high of 80 recorded in 1967, Burg said.
“The coastal areas had a cooler marine air move through, so they weren’t quite as hot,” he said.
Burg said he expects today to remain hot — but not as hot as Sunday — and for temperatures to slowly cool back to the mid 70s by the end of the week.
