We can say that the battle against drought is not lost. And, although summer is going to end with a final blast of high temperatures, we must remember that September is a month of contrasts: the same day that 84 liters per square meter were collected in the Balearic archipelago, Catalonia spent a good part of the province of Girona to a “state of emergency” due to the drought.
What matters is the long term. And there we still have a chance.
Colder than Eastern Europe… After the last BFA and last week’s cold front, with the help of a small DANA in the southeast and thanks to a huge cold mass at mid levels, this week has been very cold (for the time of year). We are talking about between 5 and 10 degrees below usual.
It should not surprise us because, as we speak, a cold front is penetrating through the northwest, leaving numerous rainfall that will affect (especially) Galicia and the western half of the Cantabrian Sea. Although it will move towards the southeast, it does not seem likely that it will reach the Mediterranean with much force. And that is key.
…and now, suddenly, summer returns. It is key because as this front disintegrates, the weather will begin to stabilize and autumn will arrive on the peninsula in an atmosphere more typical of summer than any other season. Not in vain, more than 30 degrees will be reached in many provincial capitals and will be exceeded in areas such as the Guadalquivir valley.
What’s going on here? Something that we talked about a few days ago is happening: that September is a month capable of almost anything. Without the atmospheric blockages that usually stabilize the summer in Spain and seeing how the reactivation of polar dynamics begins to send us masses of cold air, the country’s meteorology is defenseless against everything that approaches it.
On the one hand, as the days are still long, two days of stability lead to a significant rise in temperatures. On the other hand, the arrival of a cold front leads to a drop in temperatures to figures similar to those at the end of November. They are normal phenomena… that can happen hours apart.
ECMWF
Looking to autumn with hope. If we look a little further, everything seems to indicate that the period of rain and cool temperatures ends in the last third of September. “The change of month can pass under a ridge and a practically summer atmosphere,” said the meteorologist Victor M. González and it will be like this.
However, we have good news: “models see quite a bit of activity in the eastern Atlantic this fall and a wet trend in western Europe.” That is to say, there is a high probability that “rainfall in the entire Iberian Peninsula will be above normal this autumn.” Especially the entire Atlantic slope.
We have a lot at stake there, but we have good cards.
In Xataka | Neither DANA nor storm: the very intense rains this weekend have another origin and that has consequences
Imagen | ECMWF
