Droughts longer, rainfall more erratic over the last five decades in most of the West
The time between rainfalls have become longer and occurred more erratically in the last 50 years in the Southwest. Image shows a section of the Santa Rita Experimental Range site outside Tucson, Ariz. Photo byJoel Biederman
-USDA ARS
TUCSON, Ariz. Dry periods between rainstorms have become longer and annual rainfall has become more erratic across most of the western United States during the past 50 years, according to a study published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service and the University of Arizona.
Droughts Longer, Rainfall More Erratic Over the Last Five Decades in Most of the West
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Droughts Longer, Rainfall More Erratic Over the Last Five Decades in Most of the West : USDA ARS
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Longer droughts and spotty rainfall are a recipe for water shortage something already being seen throughout much of the American West.
The time between rainfalls has become longer and the rains occurred more erratically in the western U.S. during the last 50 years. (Joel Biederman / Agricultural Research Service)
(CN) With climate change, scientists expect the Southwest U.S. to become hotter and drier over the next century. And according to research published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters on Tuesday, that trend has been well underway for the last half century.
Researchers from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service and the University of Arizona analyzed daily meteorological observations recorded from 1976 to 2019. Compiled by the Global Historical Climatology Network, the data spanned 337 long-term weather stations distributed across the American West.