Virginia Key Water Temperatures Shattering Records Amid Extreme Heat and It's Not Even Summer

The official start of summer is still three weeks away, but ocean temperatures in South Florida are already hitting peak summer highs.

For the past 12 days, as Miamians have grappled with record-breaking heat on land, the water temperature measured at Virginia Key off of Key Biscayne has hit record highs, reaching temperatures that are more common during the peak summer months of July and August.

Brian McNoldy, a senior research associate at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science, tells New Times that the average water temperature in May has been four degrees Fahrenheit above normal. McNoldy notes that the highest recorded water temperature at Virginia Key this month came on Monday, May 27, at 88.9 degrees — and we've still got three days to go.

"That's a pretty big anomaly," McNoldy says. "It was a record-breaker for air temperatures and heat index and now we are at 12 days of breaking records for water temperature."

May has been a scorcher for the Sunshine State and the Magic City, with the heat index (AKA the "feels like" temperature, which takes humidity into account) reaching 112 degrees on May 18 and 19, exceeding the previous daily record by a whopping 11 degrees.

McNoldy says it will be the warmest May on record in Miami by about 1.5 degrees — a "pretty big margin," in weather parlance — with an estimated monthly average of nearly 84 degrees. The average heat index, he adds, will likely break the previous record by two degrees.

McNoldy reiterates that it is not a promising start as the state heads into the warmest time of year.

The water temperature is already inching closer to last year's 90-degree temperatures that decimated and bleached coral populations in the Florida Keys. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has predicted a "significantly above normal" hurricane season because of the warm Atlantic Ocean temperatures in the Atlantic basin.

"The only way we could probably stop breaking records in the immediate future is to have a day that's a little more cloudy," McNoldy says. "It'll still be warm, but that could end the streak of record-breaking."