Someone named WOT has been arguing with me all afternoon, trying to claim that the heavy rain in Colorado has been over the mountains. So I overlaid precipitation map on the map of Colorado.
The heavy rain is east of the Continental Divide, over the plains. Denver is the red circle.
I stand corrected on the yellow dot, but I stand by a few statements:
1) Most precip in CO is in the mountains
2) This isn’t enough to reverse the drought
3) This isn’t quote “4 to 8 inches of widespread rain”
4) Radar estimates aren’t very accurate
You have no idea what you are talking about. We average 14 inches of rain a year, and have had nearly 50% of that during the last month. I have never seen it so green here in August before.
Denver recorded 0.35 inches of rain this month:
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAPA/2012/8/3/MonthlyHistory.html
It is August 3. If it kept that pace for the entire month, it would be more than 250% of normal.
1.23 inches last month
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAPA/2012/7/3/MonthlyHistory.html
“It is August 3. If it kept that pace for the entire month, it would be more than 250% of normal. ”
It more than likely won’t. You can’t use a few days to determine a trend. Three days does not 31 make. The only place in the world where three days could possibly determine a monthly total would be somewhere that gets a seasonal monsoon like the Maldives – or hardly no precipitation at all like Antarctica.
What part of we have had a month of heavy rain isn’t clear?
The observations out of Denver don’t show a month of heavy rain.
300% of normal over the last month here in Fort Collins
And WOT spins on ; never letting the facts get in the way of his retoric
Goddard claimed that the plains get more rain than the mountains. I showed this to be factually incorrect. He claimed that eastern Colorado received 4-8″ of rain. You have a narrow band of 4″, but radar estimates aren’t ground measurements and aren’t always accurate. So why isn’t he pulling up weather station data? He also claimed that this would be enough to reverse a major drought. It wouldn’t be. You need a long term period of rain to reverse a heavy drought. Otherwise the rain just runs off and evaporates.
So do you have anything besides hyperbole?
This is what happens when you get a few inches in a short amount of time and why it’s not good enough for real drought relief:
http://www.lcra.org/water/drought/index.html
Here’s the yellow dot:
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KLIC/2012/7/3/MonthlyHistory.html
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KLIC/2012/8/3/MonthlyHistory.html
0.79 + 0.05 inches. It doesn’t seem that yellow dot is 8″.
By the way, the station I pulled was KAPA – which was closer to the green blob than DEN
KCOS was 1.39 and 0.02
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KCOS/2012/7/3/MonthlyHistory.html
Anything else? That graphic isn’t correct, because radar estimates usually aren’t correct.
The radar is far more accurate than a single gauge. We have been getting tons of rain
http://www.hprcc.unl.edu/maps/current/index.php?action=update_daterange&daterange=30d
Nice graph Steven, the longer a range you choose, the worse it looks for WOTs mountains-are-rain-magnets hyp-erbol-othesis
KAKO is 1.03 plus 0.03
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAKO/2012/8/3/MonthlyHistory.html
That is how thunderstorms work. They hit some places and miss others.
Nevermind I’m looking at the wrong columns (it’s late and my eyes are fuzzy.
Here are the totals from July 1 to Aug 3:
KAKO – 2.90
KCSO – 3.58
KLIC – 2.31
KAPA – 2.92
So the radar estimates are still higher than what was actually recorded in most cases.
I’ll grand you it’s above average, but you need more than that to reverse a long term drought, even in Colorado.
BWAAAAHAHAHAHA! Bulls Hitter indeed! 😆
So I am willing to correct myself I’m less of a person somehow? When has Goddard corrected himself on anything? Could you link me?
I am hardly ever wrong.
Ok ya Bulls Hitter! LMAO!
“I am hardly ever wrong.”
Not judging by your blog. You’ve been wrong on lots of things – and those are just the things I noticed today. Who knows what I’ll find if I go beyond page 3 of this blog.
Feel free to list them. I have more than 10,000 posts here.
WOW, it’s heavy on the Bulls Hitting, ya may need hip waders here soon it’s getting so deep! And it is a newbee to boot, by the sounds of it! 😆
“Feel free to list them. I have more than 10,000 posts here.”
I already commented on the ones I saw that were glaringly obvious. But judging by your track record you immediately go in denial whenever you’re called out on anything. I mean you thought the 1892 cyclone was in the Atlantic for goodness sakes, and that it hit in June – when a minute on google would have shown you it was in the southern hemisphere in April. You also said there were two hurricanes that hit land in 1908 before May. This was also glaringly wrong because only one was in May, it was a minimal hurricane, and it did not make landfall.
Go for it. You told me already that the heavy rain was in the mountains and that hurricanes have increased. ROFLMAO
No. I said initially that the heavy rain was likely in the mountains – and I stood corrected on that. However I also said that on average the highest elevations get more rain in CO than the rest of the state – and I backed it up with actual data.
You said that this was widespread 4-8″. I haven’t found a total yet that was above 4″, let alone 8″ for any station listed in that area. Most were between 2 and 3″. Therefore the radar estimates (as usual) were over the real amounts.
You also said that the NWS was somehow lying about the state of the drought, and I pointed out that a short term amount of drought relief does NOT always reverse long term drought – and this isn’t enough rain to do so even for a month.
Now do you have any real data to offer or do you just have insults and hyperbole?
Or will you go mysteriously silent like you have with some of my posts.
He is very good at darts isn’t he or it errr something…..
“He is very good at darts isn’t he or it errr something…..”
Where’s your substance in that post? Do you have anything besides talking points or rhetoric?
Yeah, Bulls Hitters like you are a dime a dozen, if you think your the first guess again! LMAO!
So you’re going to ignore your mistake about the 1908 hurricane season? You’re going to ignore the fact that you thought the 1892 cyclone was an Atlantic hurricane?
What are you talking about? There was a category 2 hurricane in early March
“the earliest known cyclone of this strength during the course of a season ”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1908_Atlantic_hurricane_season
stevengoddard says:
August 4, 2012 at 4:48 am
In 1908 the US was hit by two large hurricanes by the end of May. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1908_Atlantic_hurricane_season
OK. One of the 1908 hurricanes didn’t hit the US. It was the earliest 100 MPH hurricane on record and the other was the earliest hurricane strike in US history.
No doubt you are aware that Hansen lists 1907 as the coldest year on record.
“OK. One of the 1908 hurricanes didn’t hit the US. It was the earliest 100 MPH hurricane on record and the other was the earliest hurricane strike in US history.
No doubt you are aware that Hansen lists 1907 as the coldest year on record.”
Landfalls do not correlate to active seasons. Since 1907 is not 1908, what is your point?
Also, this is just the Atlantic basin. Did you bother to look at the western pacific? Or any other basin for that matter? I pointed out a January Typhoon of 155mph. There have been super typhoons in December.
What’s your point? Do you have one?
You are cracking me up. Hansen lists 1907 as the coldest year on record, and three months later is the earliest cat 2 on record in the Atlantic basin. More than five months earlier than 2012.
BWAAAAAAHAHAHAHA! Oh My Where did they come up with this one?
WOT, WAT, WHAT.
What is the first thing one should do when one is in a hole?
Stop digging!
Good advice, but I don’t see Goddard stopping his blog any time soon.
Me don’t see you stop trolling here much either! 😆
According to CoCoRAHS (http://www.cocorahs.org/) an organization of weather hobbyists which reports rain and snowfall, (of which I am a member) of 456 stations reporting 30 or 31 observations in July, the average rainfall was 2.66″ with 56 stations reporting 4″ or greater.Two stations in Nederland reported over 8″ and one of the two reported 9.22″ for the month.
If I include all stations, except those reporting 0 or 1 observations, a total of 1043, five (5) Nederland stations reported 8″ or more of precip and the average statewide is 3.67″ (some observers only post when there is precipitation). We use 8″ manual rain gauges and are trained by university and/or NWS personnel in locating our gauges and reporting our precipitation observations.There is indeed, an 8″ bullseye around Nederland. Considering that average monthly July rainfall is around 2 inches, I think it is safe to say that July was a very wet month for Colorado. (5 stations in Ft Collins reported over 5″ of rain in July).
TKO for Goddard over WOT.
This seems to be common theme. An alarmist claims a skeptic blog is wrong on “lots of things” but can’t seem to find any errors out of 10,000 posts other than when a hurricane made land fall over 100 years ago. That tells me all I need to know about the alarmists out there.
Mr Goddard,
With all due respect, a major portion of northeast Colorado has not received any rain recently. Night after night the clouds would move in and the radar would show lots of green cover, but not a drop fell. Even my weeds are dry and crunchy. There have been a few, slow moving thunderstorms, and if it did rain, it would pour. But those areas were small in area and very scattered. I have information from two stations. One is in Sidney, Nebraska, which is just over the state line, and therefore representative of the extreme northern edge of Colorado, and the other one is in Akron, Colorado.
0.02 inches Sidney, week of July 29-Aug 3 2012 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KSNY/2012/8/3/WeeklyHistory.html
.14 inches for the week. Sidney, week of July 22- July 28, 2012 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KSNY/2012/7/27/WeeklyHistory.html 0.00 inches Sidney, week of July 15-21 2012 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KSNY/2012/7/20/WeeklyHistory.html
.66 inches Akron, Colorado week of July 29-Aug 3, 2012
http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAKO/2012/8/4/WeeklyHistory.html
.03 inches Akron Colorado week of July 22-July 28, 2012 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAKO/2012/7/28/WeeklyHistory.html
0.00 inches Akron, Colorado week of July 15-21 2012 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAKO/2012/7/21/WeeklyHistory.html
I appreciate all the time you take on your blog, and thoroughly enjoy reading it. But just as ALL of Colorado was not burning, neither is ALL of Colorado out of their drought. If you look at year to date on precipitation, it tells the story.
Sidney Nebraska, YTD 5.84 inches. Normal is 11.89 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KSNY/2012/7/20/DailyHistory.html
Akron Colorado YTD 6.24 inches. Normal is 11.48 http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KAKO/2012/8/3/DailyHistory.html?req_city=NA&req_state=NA&req_statename=NA
Chuck L says: August 4, 2012 at 12:31 pm
Thanks, I was going to point to the same link. One can call up a daily map of the state and get a good visual impression of the precipitation.