Heavy Rain And Localized Flooding In The Desert Southwest

4 Dec 2022, 3:05 pm

A dry stretch of weather that has featured Tucson, Arizona going more than 50 days without measurable rain has come to an end. The city in southeast Arizona is part of an area in the Desert Southwest that has been receiving welcome rainfall. In fact, Saturday, a the daily record for rainfall was broken in Phoenix. 0.76″ might not seem like a lot of rain, but this is more than what the area averages for the entire month of December!

A marginal threat of Excessive Rainfall remains across portions of Arizona and New Mexico through the rest of Sunday.

There is a marginal risk of excessive rainfall in parts of Arizona today because of the rain moving over the same areas for an extended period of time. This means isolated pockets of heavy rain will lead to (normally dry) slot canyons filling up with rushing water.

Coverage of the showers will gradually decrease throughout the day Sunday.

Normally dry slot canyons could fill with water quickly. Avoid traveling through flooded areas. If a road is closed to flooding, turn around and find an alternative route!

Temperatures will stay near seasonal averages during this time. The air mass won’t necessarily be very cold. Watch out for flooded roads and avoid those closed areas! Also, listen out for thunder and watch out for lightning as thunderstorms develop this weekend.

About the author

Taban Sharifi

Taban Sharifi grew up in Southern California between Los Angeles and San Diego. She is a Certified Broadcast Meteorologist (CBM) with the American Meteorological Society (AMS). She has a B.S. in Atmospheric, Oceanic, and Environmental Sciences with a minor in Environmental Systems and Society from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Go Bruins! While in school, Taban was a meteorology... Load More intern with NBC LA. There she helped forecast daily weather for the greater Los Angeles region and created a playbook to deploy weather sensors for NBC owned-and-operated stations across the country. Her first on-air job took her to San Angelo, Texas, where she was a morning meteorologist and co-anchor. Working in West Texas gave her knowledge and experience covering severe storms. From there, she moved to Palm Springs, California. People think forecasting in California is sunshine all the time, but with temperatures in the 120’s, wildfires, damaging winds, floodings, and earthquakes, the forecasting kept her very busy! She also worked there as a general assignment reporter and told community stories. Taban is excited for the challenge and opportunity to forecast nationally with WeatherNation. She also looks forward to exploring all that Colorado has to offer!