The Climate Services Team at the National Weather Service’s Hanford station has completed its weather summary for March 2026 — and it’s a doozy.

Not only did the month clock in as the warmest March on record in Bakersfield, but it was the warmest March as well in Fresno, Hanford, Madera and Merced, Brian Ochs and JP Kalb, members of the Climate Services Team, said in their summary.

But the unseasonably warm late winter and early spring weather didn’t just break records in the San Joaquin Valley. It also tied or set new records in cities from San Francisco to Lubbock, Texas and from St. Louis to Albuquerque, N.M.

“There were highs in the triple digits out in the desert and into Arizona,” Ochs said in a phone call Thursday. “This was, indeed, a very widespread event.

“We had a strong ridge of high pressure over much of the western U.S., and it was a persistent ridge,” Ochs said. “Not only was it persistent, it was also unusually strong for the time of year.”

In Bakersfield, the string of new records began on March 17 when a maximum temperature of 90 degrees broke the record of 88 degrees previously set for the date in 2004.

On the 18th, an afternoon high of 95 degrees not only broke the record of 92 degrees previously set for the date in 2004, but it also was the highest temperature ever recorded in the month of March in Bakersfield — since daily record keeping began in 1893.

That monthly record would be repeated three days later on the 21st with another high of 95.

In all, through the 29th, six record high daily temperatures were broken and two were tied.

But it wasn’t just the daytime temperatures that soared. Record high minimum temperatures, set overnight, were broken six times and tied twice.

“Because it got so warm (during the day), it makes it more difficult to recover overnight,” Ochs said.

We experience that phenomenon pretty much every summer, he said, but March is not summer. Not even close.

A stretch of heat like this in late winter and early spring is “remarkable,” Ochs said, “especially with the duration and just how warm it got.

“Normally you don’t expect this kind of weather until May or June,” he said. “It’s definitely noteworthy.”

March 2026 also turned out to be one of the driest on record. After 30 days with zero rain, precipitation was finally recorded on the 31st, the last day of the month.

It was only 0.06 inches as measured at Meadows Field Airport, but it was enough to keep Bakersfield out of the zero column.