The Randomness of Thunderstorms
This weekend’s thunderstorms didn’t bring much drought relief to Gwinnett county, despite the tempting red splotches on the radar all around. Saturday morning brought less than a tenth of an inch at my house, and then nothing for the rest of the weekend.
Other locations did see a reasonable amount of precipitation, though. A storm passing through early Sunday morning and some afternoon rainfall brought .78 inches of rain to Covington–the most rain recorded in North Georgia on Sunday. Meanwhile rainfall amounts varied a lot, even at relatively close distances. Marietta recorded .73 inches on Sunday, while nearby Charlie Brown Airport in Atlanta got not a drop. In Cartersville, they had a quarter of an inch, while Rome received only trace precipitation. Atlanta, which has recorded a scant .23 inches of rain for all of June ended Sunday with only 1/100 of an inch of rain.
The weather over the last week or so has featured an upper level trough over the east coast that has tended to keep tropical air from the Gulf of Mexico away. Thus dew points have been relatively low, making it harder to generate thunderstorms. The rain we’ve had has been caused by small disturbances traveling on the edge of the trough. That is likely to change later in the week, as the trough moves out and moist air returns. However after this evening, we’re not likely to have a good chance for precipitation until the weekend.
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June 23rd, 2008 at 9:26 pm
We unofficially recorded over an inch at our house in Duluth Saturday night/Sunday morning. It rained very hard here for a couple of hours — tons of lightning, thunder. The ground stayed wet through Sunday so I knew we’d had quite a lot. It was nice to be in a little rain-pocket. The grass and my flowers were certainly happy.