Monday September 23rd… Dear Diary. The main purpose of this ongoing blog will be to track United States extreme or record temperatures related to climate change. Any reports I see of ETs will be listed below the main topic of the day. I’ll refer to extreme or record temperatures as ETs (not extraterrestrials).😉
From Flood to Drought…A New Threat For Portions of the United States
The United States is no stranger to drought, but has not seen a large area of historic dryness since 2016. If anything most of the country in growing belts since 2016 has seen too much water where widespread flooding has occurred. Just recently a burgeoning drought in eastern Texas was quenched with too much water because of Tropical Storm Imelda. We have seen, though, a stubborn to move heat dome that has persisted over the summer over the Southeast that has dried out that area. Here is the latest U.S. Drought Monitor map for the nation:
Areas depicted on the above chart that have cropped up over the Southwest and Texas will diminish due to Imelda and a synoptic setup that will bring some rain this week to Arizona. Usually during hotter summers and falls brought about by climate change some portions of the lower 48 states go into drought mode, and indeed it looks like the Southeast, Ohio Valley, and the Middle Atlantic are the areas to watch this year. The wildcard, as usual, during September and October will be any landfalling tropical storm that hits anywhere from the lower Mississippi Valley eastward to the Carolinas, which would quickly end any worsening drought.
I bring this topic up today because we are beginning to see climate change influenced weather pattern changes causing drought to deluge back to drought periods across the country that probably will hamper those farming to produce good drops. Don’t forget that during “normal” times farming is a hard, dicey affair to begin with. Theses switches are taking the better part of 5-10 years for a complete drought to deluge back to drought cycle to occur. You can ask anybody currently living in Texas about that. Farmers still do luck out, though, perhaps seeing a few consecutive months in between any transitions that are near optimal for growing traditional drops. We are seeing, though, heavier deluges and longer times in between good months for farming.
You can also blame the fact that most areas are getting hotter at all times of the year. Hotter weather leads to drier weather, leading to hotter weather creating a vicious cycle causing drought. We will see how any drought areas evolve across the United States during climatologically wetter and colder months from late 2019 into early 2020.
Here is more climate and weather news from Monday:
(As usual, this will be a fluid post in which more information gets added during the day as it crosses my radar, crediting all who have put it on-line. Items will be archived on this site for posterity. In most instances click on the pictures of each tweet to see each article.)
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Guy Walton- “The Climate Guy”