Profile
Photos
Comments
Rainy season just keeps getting wetter
By Ken Kaye
South Florida Sun Sentinel
June 8, 2009
%3B%7Eokv%3D%3Bsz%3D300x
In less than a month, South Florida made a dramatic transformation from bone dry to soggy wet.
Get used to it.
The
National Weather Service's long-range outlook calls for more rain than
normal through August. Potentially, this rainy season, May through
October, could produce up to 15 inches more rain than normal,
forecasters said.
"I don't see a real immediate end to all
this," said meteorologist Robert Molleda. "This is just the way the
weather patterns set up."
What caused such a pronounced change?
In May, high pressure was replaced by low pressure in the atmosphere.
The low pressure pulled moisture up from the Caribbean and created
instability.
Voila: Clouds, rain and thunderstorms, Molleda said.
He added that there's no correlation between May rainfall and hurricane season activity.
Whether
the region will continue to see above-normal rainfall beyond August
remains in question. The weather service has difficulty looking that
far ahead, said Bob Ebaugh, weather service specialist.
"The confidence level is through August," he said. "We could go out beyond that, but it would be a dart shoot."
At
the beginning of May, South Florida was under dire drought conditions,
with some areas receiving less than 10 percent of their normal rainfall
since November. Wildfire danger was high and lawns were brown.
By
the end of the month, much of the region had received more than 10
inches of rain, more than in the previous six months combined. Swales
and streets turned into small lakes with each downpour.
West
Palm Beach was drenched with 15.7 inches of rain, its second-wettest
May ever behind May 1890, when 16.2 inches of rain fell.
Still,
the South Florida Water Management District asks residents to continue
conserving water. A good way to do that is to turn off lawn sprinklers
for a week at a time, district spokesman Gabe Margasak said.
He noted that Lake Okeechobee, the region's key backup water supply, remains almost 2 feet below normal.
"Even
though this rain has been terrific and recharged a lot of the system,
our regional supplies and the lake have not come up to their optimum
levels yet," he said.
The Florida Division of Forestry said the
rain has greatly reduced the risk of wildfire, although residents are
asked to continue being careful with cigarettes and combustible
materials.
"The rain has really recharged the soil, so the
moisture is getting back to normal," said Scott Peterich, the
division's wildfire mitigation specialist. "The vegetation is not as
stressed."
Ken Kaye can be reached at kkaye@sunsentinel.com or 954-385-7911.