The weather has turned in favor of more moisture for Southwest Colorado into September, signaling a possible drought-buster.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s one of our better monsoons we have seen in awhile and is producing deep moisture, often for three or four days in a row,\u201d said meteorologist Chris Cuoco, of the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n
The Southwest monsoon is a seasonal shift in wind flow from the tropical south that funnels moisture into New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah. It has occurred regularly since 1900.<\/p>\n
Each July, the Bermuda high pressure system repositions over the Gulf of Mexico, causing winds to shift around it and producing the monsoon.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can see the plume of moisture on satellite, drawing moisture from the eastern Pacific, then delivering thunderstorms along western Mexico and into the western U.S.,\u201d Cuoco said.<\/p>\n
Also, El Ni\u00f1o, \u2013 characterized by warming of the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean \u2013 has begun, which can bring moisture to western Colorado.<\/p>\n
Cuoco rates El Ni\u00f1o as \u201cstrongly warmer,\u201d with surface temperatures rising 3 degrees Celsius.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s sizing up to compare with the strong El Ni\u00f1o in 1997 and 1998 that brought record moisture to the western U.S.,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
El Ni\u00f1o doesn\u2019t guarantee moisture for Southwest Colorado, but it can increase its chances.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause the El Ni\u00f1o is matching up with the monsoon, it signals higher than normal precipitation,\u201d Cuoco said.<\/p>\n
In 1998, a strong El Ni\u00f1o year, Cortez saw above-average precipitation, said local weather observer Jim Andrus.<\/p>\n
This year, Cortez has experienced record rainfall. May was 290 percent of normal, at 2.41 inches. June, typically the driest month, was 583 percent of normal, at 2.33 inches, and July is at 176 percent of normal, at 2.25 inches.<\/p>\n
The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration also forecasts the Four Corners to be wetter than average in July through September. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, Southwest Colorado went from severe to moderate drought in April to the current no-drought status, based on total precipitation for 2015.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ni\u00f1o, monsoon combine to ease drought<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6363],"tags":[188,13],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-111026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ds-news","tag-dolores-star","tag-frontpage-lead"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111026\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111026"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=111026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}