The Spread

Was the forecast right for Washington on Wed Sep 2?

Washington, District of Columbia · daily high temperature in °C · forecasts from each model's archived runs, verified against the DCA observations

13 days out, 4 models put Washington's Wed Sep 2 high anywhere from 20° to 32°; by the final call the field had settled to a median of 32°. The day verified at 33° against the DCA observations, with 8.4 mm of precipitation — drizzle.

ECMWF landed closest, off by 0.3°. GEM ran 2° cold.

13 days out the models said 20–32; it hit 33. ECMWF led (off 0.3°C); GEM ran 2°C cold.
The shareable card for this receipt — what this page looks like pasted into a thread.

What every model said, at every lead

Daily-high calls for Wed Sep 2 as each model's runs approached it — the last archived run per day. NBM and The Spread's own blend are consensus products and stay out of these ranges and rankings; the Washington scoreboard shows them, labelled.

Lead AIFSAIGFSECMWFGEMGFSICONUKMO Range
13d · 2026-08-20 28° 20° 25° 32° 20–32°
12d · 2026-08-21 29° 31° 27° 39° 27–39°
11d · 2026-08-22 27° 25° 29° 31° 25–31°
10d · 2026-08-23 34° 30° 28° 34° 28–34°
9d · 2026-08-24 35° 31° 37° 23° 23–37°
8d · 2026-08-25 32° 29° 38° 37° 30° 29–38°
7d · 2026-08-26 37° 36° 40° 37° 40° 36–40°
6d · 2026-08-27 36° 36° 36° 37° 39° 36° 36–39°
5d · 2026-08-28 36° 35° 38° 37° 40° 37° 33° 33–40°
4d · 2026-08-29 36° 36° 40° 36° 38° 36° 35° 35–40°
3d · 2026-08-30 35° 35° 40° 33° 39° 36° 35° 33–40°
2d · 2026-08-31 32° 32° 34° 36° 36° 34° 34° 32–36°
1d · 2026-09-01 30° 33° 31° 29° 37° 30° 35° 29–37°
0d · 2026-09-02 32° 32° 32° 31° 34° 33° 32° 31–34°
actual 33°

Read it honestly

This is one date, not a league table. A model can win a day it deserved to lose; rankings only mean something over a window. For that, see which model has been most accurate in Washington — or every city The Spread scores.

Forecasts are what each model's archived runs said at the time, captured at The Spread's sweep times — never reconstructed after the fact. Truth is the DCA observations. Archive depth varies by city; receipts exist only for dates the archive watched arrive.