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The Southwest Rainfall Season at a Glance

Mar 29, 2011; 12:33 PM ET

As promised yesterday, today I give you the statistics of where we are at compared to normal for precipitation in the Southwest, including all of California and around the Sierra.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. In this case, a chart will do the same. The following is a list of cities with precipitation to date, normal precipitation to date and the corresponding percentage of normal. This data runs from July 1 to midnight last night.

Yesterday, I gave some of the statistics for the amount of snow in the Sierra. As one could expect, this chart shows similar conditions in the lowlands. All these cities are above normal, and from central into southwestern California, many places are between 25 and 50 percent above normal in rainfall. Obviously, La Nina had no effect on these areas. In a La Nina, it is not uncommon for the northern third of California to be at or above normal, but it is not normal once you get into the southern third to half of the state.

More La Nina-like precipitation has been the rule once you get in the Las Vegas area, over much of Arizona, New Mexico and western Texas.

La Nina is beginning to weaken, but there is no doubt that the remainder of the rainfall season (and that is not long into the future) in Arizona, New Mexico and western Texas will not make up any ground and are likely to finish the season well below normal. Obviously, California does not share in that problem. Not a drop of rain or flake of snow could fall for the rest of the spring and water conditions would still be looking great heading into the summer dry season. It's not likely to stay dry anyway.

Tomorrow, a similar report on the rest of the West.

The views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of AccuWeather, Inc. or AccuWeather.com

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About This Blog

Ken Clark
Ken Clark's Western U.S. weather blog tackles daily weather events with commentary from one of the most experienced and trusted Western U.S. weather experts.

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