Tuesday, September 22, 2015

soggy and cool... (pm.22.sep.15)>

Tuesday's stats:

Low temp: 59.4F (15.2C)
High temp: 66.9F (19.4C)
Rainfall: 3.20" (8.1cm) -- updated through midnight

We have clouds and light rain in progress this evening, with some very gusty winds at times here in the middle of the main market.  Today has been pretty much a total wash-out, with the first rain drops materializing at dawn, and numerous periods of moderate to heavy rain showers throughout the day.  There's also been zero sunshine, which has delivered the coolest high temp at my recording location in the upper part of town since way back on the 16th of April.

It took longer than expected to finally reach full development, but the weather system we've been anticipating since late last week has really packed a punch today.  This is a classic late monsoon / early autumn storm we are dealing with here across the western Himalayan region -- with an upper level circulation hanging back over central Afghanistan drawing a huge batch of lingering tropical moisture northward in its counter-clockwise circulation.  All of that moisture is getting squeezed out in the form of widespread rains as it gets lifted upward along the front slopes of the mountain ranges.  The latest computer model data this evening shows more to come for us -- with some models cutting off the most significant rains by noon tomorrow (Wed), while others keep the healthy downpours going until the wee hours of Thursday morning.

Anyway, what's left of the upper-level system will weaken and swing across north India on Thursday, which should quickly allow some stabilization to occur during the later part of the week.  The moisture content of our air mass will drop back to where it was several days ago, allowing us to resume our move toward a post-monsoon scenario.  As I mentioned last evening, it's still going to be tough to totally remove the mention of random thundershower potential from the forecast... until perhaps early next week.

Get THE 7-DAY OUTLOOK and other rainfall/monsoon/seasonal info on tabs at the top of the page.