Monsoon season has ended, and Phoenix got significant rainfall just under the wire.
Monsoon season officially lasts from June 15 to September 30 in Arizona. It started out very dry — June, July and August each had below-normal monthly rainfall. But last week’s storms were actually wet enough that Phoenix ended the season with an above-average precipitation total.
“We actually managed to do decently well compared to average,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Ryan Worley. “Normally, through an entire monsoon season, we get around 2.43 inches of rain, and we finished just above that — around 2.7 inches.”
Nearly 2 inches of that fell just on Friday and Saturday, Worley said.
“If that event had not occurred, we probably would have seen another season that was well below normal,” Worley said.
Worley said other parts of the state did not fare as well as Phoenix. Flagstaff and Tucson both ended monsoon season with below-average rain totals.
Worley said Phoenix is back to dry weather now, with no rain in the forecast for the next week.
-
A record-strong El Niño event developing in the Pacific Ocean could bring much-needed moisture to Arizona in the months ahead, but a wet winter is guaranteed.
-
The climate and sustainability program at Discovery Partners Institute at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign wants to find ways to get people heat information that is more specific to particular locations at particular times, rather than a static kind of map.
-
State health officials say they’ve confirmed nearly a thousand COVID-19 cases in the last week. At the same time, lots of Arizonans are starting to think about getting flu and COVID-19 shots for the year.
-
A report by Colorado River experts found that a federal plan for water cuts could bring Colorado River use by California, Arizona and Nevada to historically low levels.
-
Giant sequoias only grow naturally in California today. But they once ranged as far east as Colorado, Wyoming and Nevada, before the climate turned drier and pushed them into their current, narrower range.