The Southwest just got way too much of a good thing. Last weekend, a ferocious storm inundated communities and killed at least four people. Though precipitation is an essential component of Arizona’s desert climate, the state got two or three months’ worth of it in just a few days — far more than human infrastructure could handle all at once. Since September 20, an astonishing 28.84 inches of rain has fallen on Clovis, New Mexico, compared to its historical average of just 3.3 inches.
“This weekend was just adding more on the rough times that those communities in Southwest Colorado and Arizona and Utah and New Mexico have been having recently,” said Russ Schumacher, director of the Colorado Climate Center at Colorado State University, who’s also the state climatologist. “I think the El Niño connection is pretty clear.”
Indeed, that band of warm water in the Pacific could be priming much of the southern United States for a winter of increased precipitation, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad... Read more
