Ludington Water Temperatures Drop Over 32 Degrees in Less Than 12 Hours!

[XLFD]

At the official Ludington water buoy which records water temperature, The temperature fell from the mid 70s to near 40! The water temp. at 3:10 pm on Tue. August 21, 2018 was 72.7°. Just 7 hours later at 10:10 pm, the water temp. was down to 45.1°. By 2:50 am, the water temp. was reading 40.6°, according to Bill Stephen, local TV meteorologist.

Mechanical failure of the buoy?  Nope, the water was noticeably cooler, and what actually seems to have happened is upwelling a very natural process which rarely happens to this extent in the Great Lakes.

Upwelling occurs when an offshore wind blows the surface water away from the nearshore area, allowing cold water to rise from the bottom of the lake to the surface. This process can happen relatively quickly. Even after a warmer than average summer in late August, we can see 40-degree water come to shoreline areas. 

The water should warm up again when the wind goes west and brings back the warmer surface water...though it'll be tough to recover back to the mid 70s this late in the season.  Be warned if you enjoyed the exceptionally high water temperatures Ludington has had during this hot summer.

[AQUAMAN]

Us fishermen have referred to this event for many years as the lake "rolling over". The big north strong winds of the other day blew the lake over in shoreline areas, thus causing the deep colder water to be nearer in shallow waters, which explains the cold water. Winds then blew out of the west, now it's southerly again which will begin to make shallower waters warm again. The salmon and other fish react by believing fall is near, and they start to group up and run the PM Lake, then the PM River, which is happening at the present time. If you have a smaller boat and like catching, go into the PM and check your graph for the marks, and good luck.

[Willy]

40 degrees is pretty darn cold but as Aquaman stated, it can increase one's fishing success. Did anyone spot left over winter ice that floated up from the lake bed? Wouldn't it be funny if ice burgs suddenly appeared.

[XLFD]

That looks like an August Lake Superior rollover/upwelling, Willy.  

Aquaman makes some good points, and I find it weird that all local news didn't cover this at all.  If you were a tourist and went out swimming Tuesday afternoon in 75 degree water, and then came back the next day, where air temperatures were still warm, and went without a care into the water, you could have suffered some problems when you ran out into the 40 degree water, like choking on your retracting testicles (men only).  

But even though that might signal bad news for the tourists interested in swimming, it would signal good news for those interested in the next phase of our tourism, salmon fishing.