Saturday, August 22, 2015

clouds-rain-rainbow... (pm.22.aug.15)>

Saturday's stats:

Low temp: 61.5F (16.4C)
High temp: 69.0F (20.6C)
Rainfall: 1.30" (3.3cm) -- updated @ 8:10pm

Our sky is partly cloudy as the sun sets this evening, and just within the last half hour or so there has been a bright rainbow visible to the east.  The air is very clean and fresh, after our period of heavy rain between roughly 4:40 and 6:00pm.  I haven't had a chance to check the gauge since the rain had barely started, so check back for an update later this evening.  Otherwise we had mostly cloudy skies today with periods of thick fog during the afternoon hours.  The high temp was the coolest I've recorded since back on the 9th of this month.

Here at the end of August we normally start to see the first traces of a change of seasons, but it can take several weeks for that transition to play itself out.  That's starting to happen now, as deep tropical moisture begins to be more regularly challenged by the first tentative encroachments of drier air from the west and northwest.  Our location right on the front slopes of the Dhauladhars can keep us in a vulnerable position for almost daily spells of rain and thunder, mainly during the afternoon and evening hours, in spite of the slight reduction in the average daily moisture content of our air mass.

What this means is that average humidity readings in the 85-95% range should start to tick downward -- perhaps as low as 70-80% on some days.  That may not sound like a big deal, but it can make a big difference in terms of the hours per day that we have to deal with fog.  It will also contribute to gradually lower daily average rainfall totals.  There will still be plenty of episodes of moderate to heavy rainfall in the days and few weeks to come, but they will most likely become fewer and further between.  Stay tuned as we track the transition.

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