Tuesday, July 16, 2013

the rainfall tally... (am.16.jul.13)>

I'm very happy to be back in McLeod, and back on the weather desk, after a bit more than 7 weeks away.  After the first month of monsoon rains, my apartment was in fairly good shape when I walked in yesterday morning -- which is in contrast with what I found last year after being gone for the latter two-thirds of the rainy season.

The temperature this morning is 68.5F (20.3C), and the humidity is flirting with 100% -- stats which are pretty much on par with what we would expect on a mid-July morning.

I just recorded 1.66" (4.2cm) in the rain gauge from heavy overnight rains.  And here are some comprehensive rainfall stats, which have been carefully and meticulously tallied by my neighbor Tom while I was away:

July thus far -- 13.78" (35.0cm) -- up to 6am this morning
June total -- 20.03" (50.9cm)
May 27-28 -- 0.47" (1.2cm)

That means the total rainfall since I left McLeod on the 20th of May has been 34.28" (87.1cm) -- with the vast majority of that occurring since monsoon conditions began cranking up between the 10th and 15th of June.  Although the monsoon's arrival was around two weeks early this year, there have been several periods where the deep tropical moisture has been on the wane, allowing some relatively dry stretches to keep things more tolerable than usual for July.  Current computer model data is pointing to a major resurgence of that tropical moisture as we head toward the end of this week, however.