It’s official — this weekend’s heat is a record for our area.

Three local weather stations were among those who tied or exceeded record temperatures Sunday and Monday.Forecasters say that the conditions were similar to a midsummer heat wave, but they came in late September rather than mid July.“It’s not unusual to get this hot in September, but usually early,” Accuweather Senior Meteorologist Dave Dobek said. “By the time you get this deep into the month, it’s pretty rare.”Locals say that this is higher than the average temperature you would see in mid summer. Forecaster Rob Heckman of Summit Hill regularly shares his forecasts with over 7,000 people on his facebook group.He said the temperatures are high for what he sees in mid-summer here.“This is well above normal for the middle of summer. We normally get an Indian summer in late September or October, but that only lasts a day or two. This has been the past week,” he said.Scranton School District dismissed students early Monday for the weather. Local schools said their air conditioning was up to the task.National Weather Service doesn’t recognize any records from Carbon County. The closest are the Allentown, Scranton-Wilkes Barre, and Mount Pocono airports.On Sunday, all three showed record temperatures. On Monday, they were at or just below record heat.Monday’s record in Scranton was 91. It was 2 degrees hotter than the previous record set back in 1908!That followed Sunday’s record of 91, which surpassed a mark set in 2010.Allentown tied two records set in 1972 on Sunday and Monday. It was 92 both days.Mount Pocono also set records on both days -- 85 degrees. Those were set in 2010.Overall, it’s about 20 degrees hotter than the average monthly high for September. Record lows for Allentown and Scranton are in the low 50s this time of year.The reason NWS relies on those stations is that they have been keeping records for more than a century.“They have a long established string of data for those locations,” Dobek said. “There are new reporting stations. They’re OK, but they’re not as useful as the long established stations,” Dobek said.Heckman said the Mount Pocono weather station is a good benchmark for areas like Albrightsville and Lake Harmony, which sit at a higher elevation. In areas like Lehighton and Palmerton, it can be another seven degrees hotter.There are multiple factors to contribute to the hot weather. One is a lack of rain, meaning the sun’s energy spends less time drying the soil, and more time heating the air.The recent tropical storms in the Gulf are a contributing factor in the high temperatures, but not the only one, Dobek said.Jose and Maria have effectively blocked a warm front in our area. Whereas it would normally have moved out to be replaced by a cold front, the tropical storms have kept the warm air here.Unfortunately, the unseasonably warm weather has to eventually move along. That will probably happen on Thursday.The effect won’t be too drastic -- temperatures will cool back to the average daytime temperature of about 65, and there may be a few showers.“People are going to complain it’s cold out, but that’s average, that’s what it’s supposed to be. It isn’t supposed to be the 70s 80s and 90s,” Heckman said.