Monday, August 15, 2005

Monsoon Season

(originally posted on fishbowlinsider 8/15/05)
The North American monsoon occurs from mid July into September and affects Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and California . It pushes as far west as the Peninsular Ranges and Transverse Ranges of southern California but rarely reaches the coastal strip (a wall of desert thunderstorms only a half-hour's drive away is a common summer sight from the sunny skies along the coast). The North American monsoon is associated with an area of high pressure, called the subtropical ridge that moves northward during the monsoon season. At the surface, the monsoon is associated with a weak high that forms over the four corners region and a thermal low that forms over the Colorado River valley. The Bermuda high also plays some role in the monsoon. The placement of the high and low pressure areas causes the wind to shift from westerly to southerly. Moisture is drawn northward from the Gulf of California into northern Mexico and the Southwest United States. Rainfall during the monsoon occurs as thunderstorms over the southern Rocky Mountains and adjacent areas. This season of almost daily thunderstorms is often called the Southwest, Mexican or Arizona monsoon. It is also sometimes called the Desert Monsoon as a large part of the affected area is desert. As much as 70% of rainfall in the region occurs during the summer monsoon season. Many desert plants are adapted to take advantage of this wet season in the usually-dry area. Because of the danger of being caught in the open when these storms suddenly appear, many golf courses in Arizona have thunderstorm warning systems.(and New Mexico, theres a golf course near us and we can hear the siren after the first site of lightning)

Since I first moved to Phoenix almost 6 years ago I have loved the Monsoon Season. It is so refreshing from the HOT summer days. Here in New Mexico they don't typically start till mid July. And this summer has had an even later start. It gets really humid during this time of year and you can see the thunderclouds building and rolling in from the South East. For the past few weeks, we've had the clouds and the humidity but not much of the rain. And for the past week, it has looked and felt like Portland, Oregon (which is one of my most favorite places). We just haven't gotten the rain. We've had much cooler temperatures as well, in fact today the predicted high is only supposed to be 78 degrees! Well Saturday night that all changed. We saw the clouds roll in, and just hoped and prayed that we would actually get some rain here in town. (it has been flooding in other parts of the state). It looked really promising, and then all of a sudden it didn't. But we were fooled. The wind started to blow from the west, then it started to sprinkle lightly around 6pm. It started to rain a little harder and then the thunder and lightning started. We heard one clap so loud that it hurt our ears and shook the house. It was the loudest thunder boom I had ever heard. And it must have ripped a hole in the clouds as well because then it started to dump down on top of us. Our satellite stopped working because of the rain, the kids were already in bed so we just went outside and stood by the front door and watched the rain fall, the gutters fill, and the rivers running down the street. For almost an hour it rained like the heavens had opened up.And for that almost hour's time the thunder rolled constantly. You couldn't hear one thunder clap end and another begin. It was just constant rumbling. The satellite came back on so we went inside to finish watching the movie we started. All of a sudden the lights and t.v. flickered, we looked at each other and thought "that was weird"and then a few seconds later there was another huge thunderclap that shook the house and hurt our ears. After that one I was so glad the kids were sleeping, and was really surprised that neither of them had woken up. A few minutes later the rain started to let up, and you could see that the sun was breaking through the clouds as it was setting because it cast this odd yellow light on everything. I'm not the only one that enjoys the cooler, wetter weather the monsoon season provides. On my morning walks I have noticed that the plants that bloom in the spring usually go dormant during the extreme heat part of the summer, but are all starting to rebloom now that the days and nights are cooler. The desert really is an amazing place...
Posted by ABQ Mom :: 8/15/2005 10:18:00 PM :: 0 Comments:

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