Miscellanea

First, David Blanchard has some some really nice lightning photos up on his web site that he took at the Grand Canyon and near Sedona - see  http://www.dblanchard.net/blog/

To contrast July and August rainfall across parts of southeast Arizona, I'll use Art Douglas' report from yesterday. He reports that so far rainfall at his place in Ash Canyon has exceeded 11 inches for July through yesterday morning. He is located near the Ash Canyon Bed and Breakfast indicated on map above. However, here on the far north side of the City of Tucson, we have measured only 1.09 inches of rain for the same period - my MS advisor, Bill Gray, used to tell his students that orders of magnitude were what was really important in meteorology, and they certainly are in assessing conditions around this part of the state this summer.

The dismal large-scale pattern continues, although temperatures have moderated a bit (only 103 F yesterday). Graphic above shows the 06 UTC WRF-NAM forecast of accumulated rainfall through noon on Thursday the 20th. The forecast below is from the 00 UTC GFS operational model and is for accumulated rainfall through 5:00 pm MST on Monday the 24th of August. Will we have to go into a Fall transition pattern to hope for a return of significant thunderstorms?

Finally, there are two intense typhoons out in the western Pacific currently, as indicated on the 06 UTC satellite image below. Typhoon Atsani is forecast, after 168-hours, to transition in a very intense, extra-tropical cyclone. This intense storm may well produce downstream pattern changes that will lead to a transition-type trough along the West coast during the last part of August. Something to watch as we head toward end of summer.