Just a quick note. It did rain at my place yesterday. Seemed wet north of Route 66 in town. Today will dry out, but Sunday through most of next week should be wetter.
But, Check this out:
Statement as of 6:05 PM MST on July 30, 2009
... Record low temperatures for northern Arizona on Jul 30 2009...
Petrified Forest (1931 - 2009) 51 54 in 2003
These records are preliminary pending official reports.
Most of July has been above average temperature in the southwest. I think this is the only record extreme I can remember for the month.
With the morning haze, slowly rising dewpoint and humid feeling in the air, I think we could see more thunderstorms today than generally predicted. We’ll see.
Wobbling high pressure and a strong jet stream seem to be the biggest issue. This week, the monsoonal high is positioned to allow a dry flow from the northeast. This has dried out Northern Arizona. More details here: NWS Tucson – Monsoon Update
This weekend through early next week should have increasing chances for and amounts of precipitation.
The wind has swung back around to the north and northwest. This brings drier air to our area. This is going to limit thunderstorm activity for roughly the next week. While breaks like this aren’t unusual for the monsoon season, we haven’t had much precipitation around most of Flagstaff this month. Thankfully, temperatures have been very close to normal for most of the month. It doesn’t look like record breaking temps are in the future, but it should be slightly warmer than normal for the next few days.
It looks like a fairly substantial amount of moisture, precipitable water, could move north out of Mexico to Arizona over the next few days. Then a shift back to drier conditions could emerge. The next few days should be like the last few, but maybe higher precip amounts.
The Shark Oil Barometer has been clear since the middle of June. Not even the slightest hint of cloudiness in it. Guess it isn’t much help with monsoon predictions.
Looks like we will have a couple more days with moisture available. Then, we will be back to the broadly isolated showers. My rain gauge logged 0.42 inches. The National Weather Service logged a remarkable 0.18inches. For a broader look, check out this link for rain in Arizona: rainlog.org. Thanks to DH and his wife for hooking me up with this site.
Sometimes I wonder if the NWS has a hole in their rain gauge. But, the point of the rainlog.org site is to help understand how widely variable the rains are during the Monsoon Season.
What happens when things don’t cool off overnight? You can end up with record high low temperatures. If you were up at Lake Powell over the weekend, you know how this feels. It refused to cool off on Saturday Night. It was hot and uncomfortable all night. Flagstaff was warm as well. The overnight clouds help blanket us and prevent some of the normal cooling. This happened last night in Flagstaff, too. Hopefully, the thunderstorm activity is going to pick up this week and provide some relief.
Statement as of 6:00 PM MST on July 19, 2009
... Record high low temperatures for northern Arizona on Jul 19 2009...
City (period of record) new high low previous record/year
Cottonwood-tuzigoot (1977 - 2009) 75 72 in 2006
Flagstaff (1899 - 2009) 62 60 in 1925
Page (1958 - 2009) 80 78 in 2003
... Record high temperatures for northern Arizona on Jul 19 2009...
City (period of record) new high previous record/year
Navajo nm (1939 - 2009) 95 95 (tied) in 1998
These records are preliminary pending official reports.
For the next week or so, it doesn’t look like there is going to be much change. Same isolated pattern for precipitation. Maybe be measurable on occassion, but not big moisture surges on the way.
At least the temperatures are fairly moderate.
From Flagstaff High School, here is an analysis of the link between summer and winter temperatures for Orlanda, Anchorage and Flagstaff. Enjoy. Nice work team.
Winter-Summer Temperature Affects Paper
Winter-Summer Termepature Affects Presentation
Not a particularly wet July, so far. The shark oil barometer has been crystal clear for quite sometime. It looks like today could bring some rain, but we will taper back to dry conditions, again.
Dewpoints across parts the region have fallen and remained low over the last week or so. Check out the dewpoints for Phoenix, Tucson, El Paso, Yuma and Flagstaff. Flagstaff is still near average, where the others have dropped significantly. For the month, with the rains before the 4th of July, we are still right about average for precipitation. That may not apply everywhere in the area due to the large variations possible in the monsoon season.
Flagstaff Dewpoint Tracker
