Atmosphere Comparison

[Jim]

The endless chatter of weather.

[Jeffshadows]

Tuesday night I was up on the roof of my guest house and was actively scanning for lightning the whole time while frantically working on something but I luckily didn't see a single flash. There was some out west?

[Dschur]

The news last night showed snow at snowbowl....

[chumley]

The news last night showed snow at snowbowl....

Really? I haven't seen the freezing line drop below 11,500 this week yet, but I guess that could get the snow level down maybe to 10,000 feet. The moisture is tropical though, so the upper levels of the atmosphere are not cold like a winter storm.

[Dschur]

It showed snow all on and under the chair lift as they are getting it ready this weekend for people....

[azbackpackr]

Chilly here, and raining, not heavily, though.

[chumley]

So back to the original post, and since we're allowed to link again, here's a link to the climate prediction center. It makes general predictions on likelihood of above/below average temperature and precipitation.
Looks like most of central and eastern AZ are slated to be wetter than normal, and most of the state will be warmer than normal for the next few months.

So an early monsoon might just happen...

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/

[Jim]

Chilly here, and raining, not heavily, though.

ditto, I'd say we picked up about 1/10 of an inch this evening by my cave.

I Checked that link, June looks to be better than normal for precip, but the rest of the season is now fairly average, so who knows. Since June is so dry here, that might be almost meaningless.

[tibber]

Are we supposed to update our avatars? did I miss the memo? If I change my avatar will I get a cool code name too?

It's been raining lightly off and on here in north Phx since about 5:30ish. It's still sprinkling now at 9:42.

Still raining this AM. Can't see the McDowells other than some of the foothills on the northern side.

I didn't check my rain gauge this AM as it was still raining but a/o last nite, 1/4 " in Cave Creek.

[writelots]

Are we supposed to update our avatars? did I miss the memo? If I change my avatar will I get a cool code name too?

Looks like you didn't have to, though I have a great shot of you at Fossil if you want to use it ;)

My raingauge said .65 inches last night - awsome! In May! I love the unpredictablility of weather!

[fairweather8588]

Rained from around 5 last night pretty much until 7 this morning here

[azbackpackr]

Are you somewhere in the Valley, fairweather? That's a lot of rain! We did get a fair amount yesterday and overnight here too, and it is very damp and cool today but didn't rain.

[fairweather8588]

Off of Bell Rd and the 101 in scottsdale, conveniently within walking distance of all of the new trails they built in the McDowells. Never got to a full on downpour, but a steady light rain for a looong time til just after 7 when I was out hikin

[azbackpackr]

We did get some more this afternoon, too. Has it dried up down there yet?

[azdesertfather]

It rained in the Matazals consistently thru when we left at 2p Sat, but down in the valley it was pretty clear.

[PaleoRob]

We're done with the monsoon! Okay, not really. But we got 3.27 inches of rain in the last 24 hours (most of it between 9am and noon). Our average yearly precip is 4.78 inches. Roads have been washed out, houses flooded. Antelope Canyon flooded and jumped Highway 98. Intense times up here.

[PaleoRob]

See http://hikearizona.com/photoset.php?ID=8057 for pictures.

[Jim]

Well, all of this rain has been from a couple of pacific lows, not a monsoon flow. Either way, I too, am sick of all this rain and want to come home back to AZ, Seattle isn't very appealing. This is 2 Memorial Day weekends in a row which look to be ruined by unseasonable precipitation.

[chumley]

Despite the 12-15 hours of rain that fairweather reported (which I also received here in Tempe) most locations in the valley only ended up with .25- .5 inches of rain. Some of the foothill areas of Scottsdale, Carefree, Fountain Hills got a few tenths more, but not much. Up on the rim between Flagstaff and Heber the totals look to be in the .5 to 1 inch range, with some isolated higher totals. Some of the high spots in the south like Kitt Peak and Mt. Lemmon picked up over 1.5 inches. All-in-all, a nice storm for May in Arizona. It should help keep the fire danger down for a few extra weeks.

I've come to learn that the best snow year on record isn't nearly as effective as an inch of rain in May or June to mitigate fire danger in Northern Arizona before the monsoon arrives around July 1st.

[azbackpackr]

Yes, I recall this has happened before, and it did help. In fact, last May we had snow here the day before Memorial Day weekend, and early bird campers got snowed in under 2 feet of it at Big Lake. I remember that Saturday morning seeing the people at the gas station, filling up to go back to Phoenix! Not too good for business, but we had no major fires around here during early summer.

[Jim]

The NWS is reporting 1.23 inches since 9:56 AM on Wednesday, and 1.22 inches for the month in their climate summary (timed at 6:43am). We've definetly had a lot of rain up here the last few days, at least at the airport. I live pretty close to the airport and tend to get similar precipitation amounts compared to them. I can definetly say it was raining hard for a while yesterday afternoon and evening. When I left my cave around 4:45 pm it was pouring rain, had been for a while, and it did so for quite a while after I got to "downtown".

This rain reminds me of the cold nasty lows we get in October or November before we get our first snows in December, but this is better for the vegetation, since this is the growing season and now is when moisture is most important to plants. After the snow melts in spring we usually get those dry winds that dry the soil out before the plants can use the soil moisture, so a late May rain or snow event is the best thing for the plants since it puts water in the soil that they can use. The best thing about this system, has been that the temperatures with the storm were very mild. So while we got over an inch of rain, it also never got to, or below freezing. This means herbaceous plants will be able to respond faster. Last year the snow and hard freezes (28 degrees) we had just after the Memorial Day storm postponed spring until well into June.

This has definetly been a pretty wet system. Even normally dry Winslow got in on the action. They've had 0.56" for the month, and yesterday's 0.46" was a record for the date. The clay in the Little Colorado valley must be plenty wet and sticky.