PHOENIX — The monsoon season officially begins on June 15 and runs until September 30. During that time, thunderstorms can often form in the heat of the day bringing heavy rain, lightning, damaging winds, dust storms, and flooding.
Not all monsoons are the same, though. Some years, our monsoon season is hot and dry and other years are not as hot and very rainy.
So, how will Monsoon 2024 play out?
The NOAA Climate Prediction Center has odds favoring a drier-than-normal monsoon across Arizona this year.
What is considered a “normal” amount of monsoon rain has changed a lot in the past 50 years.
Every 10 years, new normals are calculated based on a rolling 30-year average. Our latest update came in 2021, giving us a new average that is based on rainfall data from 1991 to 2020.
This new normal showed an average rainfall in Phoenix for the monsoon season of 2.43 inches of rain. That’s more than a quarter of an inch drier than the previous average, which is a big difference here in the desert!
This shows climate change’s impact on our monsoon weather in Phoenix. It’s not only getting hotter as our urban heat island expands but also drier as our climate changes.
With less rainfall, it’s likely to be hotter this monsoon, too. The Climate Prediction Center has odds very much favoring hotter than normal conditions in the Valley and all across the Southwest.
Hotter-than-normal conditions and drier-than-normal conditions typically go hand in hand.
Last summer was the hottest and driest on record.
It’s too soon to tell if 2024 will end up on this list of the hottest and driest monsoons on record, but all it really takes is one or two big storms to bring a lot of rain to the Valley.
So, count on ABC15 to keep you ahead of the storms. We’ll have updates on-air, online, on social media, and on all of our streaming channels.
