Warm, dry weather is expected throughout Finland for the next few days as the people celebrate Saturday’s graduations and the start of school holidays.
The highest temperatures are mostly in the mid-20th century and reach up to 27 degrees Celsius in parts of the north and east. The temperature is usually a little cooler on Fridays, when the far north might get an odd shower. The winds are mostly light and become moderate during the day in Finnish Lapland.
Conditions stay warm at night, with the lowest teens, a little cooler in the far northwest.
Next week, the weather will continue to be warm, but the chance of local rainfall and thunderstorms will increase.
On Friday, temperatures are highest in northern and central Finland, while southern Finland is also likely to break the 25-degree limit over the weekend.
Mercury will rise into the 20th century across the country in the coming days.
"Rarely do we have one uniform beautiful summer weather across the country," Yle meteorologist Matti Huutonen said Thursday afternoon.
Over the weekend, cooler air is expected to flow into the northernmost parts of the country. On Sunday, there may be rain and thunder in central and northern Lapland.
June warm start, high fire risk
In recent days, temperatures have been on average 5-7 degrees higher than usual. The nights have also been about five degrees warmer than average.
The only place of frost on Thursday morning was Salla in Finnish Lapland, and gardeners and farmers can be sure that the risk of frost during the week will soon be low, according to Huutonen.
The warmer-than-usual beginning of June was preceded by an exceptionally extreme May with snow, heat waves and thunder.
The month started cold. It was -15.1 degrees in Enontekiö on May 2 and in Kilpisjärvi on May 6. Both are in the western part of Lapland.
Less than two weeks later, the eastern city of Ilomantsi measured the highest temperature of the month, 30.8 degrees.
"At the beginning of May, 20 centimeters of snow fell in Suomussalmi and a week later it was +25 degrees," Huutonen said.
Rainfall was exceptionally heavy in many places. According to the Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI), rainy May occurs on average once a decade.
There is still the possibility of seasonal floods in south-eastern Europe, but many areas are now dry, the FMI warned on Friday of a high risk of grass or forest fires throughout northern Finland and much of the west, and it expanded almost to the country on Saturday.
Source: The Nordic Page