A Sticky Situation: The Most Humid Cities in the United States

The weather this weekend was interesting. What started as beautiful and sunny each morning quickly changed to dark and stormy by afternoon. You would look out the window and assume you needed a jacket, only to discover that it was incredibly muggy outside. What the heck? Idaho doesn’t get humid. Or so I thought...

I was intrigued. Do cities on the West Coast get humid like those on the East Coast? I decided to do a little research and was more than surprised. Not only do we experience humidity on this side of the country, but we actually top the list in many instances! Here are a few examples of some of the most humid places west of the Rocky Mountains:

1.       Forks, Washington (83 percent)

2.       Astoria, Oregon (80 percent)

3.       Olympia, Washington (78 percent)

4.       Seattle, Washington (77 percent)

5.       Eugene, Oregon (75 percent)

6.       San Francisco, California (73 percent)

The statistic about Forks surprised me, but also made sense once I thought about it. As covered in a previous blog post, it’s one of the wettest cities in the country, and according to DivineCaroline.com, “since the area is surrounded by the Pacific Ocean on the west, Puget Sound on the east, and the Olympic Mountains to the south, the wet, humid air and precipitation systems blow in off the ocean and get trapped by the mountains.”

tripadvisor.co.uk

Weather.com recently released a list of cities that would make your hair curl, and half of the places were located in Texas. These included Corpus Christie, Victoria, Port Arthur, Brownsville, and Houston (just to name a few) with around 78 percent average humidity for each.

Of course, you can’t compete with places like New Orleans, Louisiana and Jacksonville, Florida when it comes to humidity. Both of these locations experience a staggering 86 percent average humidity. 

It’s important to note that the temperature makes a huge difference when it comes to humidity. For example, 80 percent humidity in Astoria, Oregon when it’s 60 degrees outside is going to feel a lot different than 78 percent humidity when it’s 90 degrees in New Orleans. I think everyone would agree that they’d feel much more comfortable in Astoria with the higher humidity and lower temperature than in New Orleans with the higher temperature and slightly lower humidity.

Where do you live? Do you experience humidity on a regular basis? Have you traveled somewhere and experienced intense humidity? Fortunately, Rite in the Rain journals are proven to work in the most extreme conditions – whether that be rain or humidity. Give them a try and find out for yourself!