Currently, half of the world's measured precipitation that falls in a year falls in just 12 days, according to a new analysis of data collected at weather stations across the globe.
Currently, half of the world's measured precipitation that falls in a year falls in just 12 days, according to a new analysis of data collected at weather stations across the globe.
By century's end, climate models project that this lopsided distribution of rain and snow is likely to become even more skewed, with half of annual precipitation falling in 11 days.
These results are published in Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union.
Previous studies have shown that we can expect both an increase in extreme weather events and a smaller increase in average annual precipitation in the future as the climate warms, but researchers are still exploring the relationship between those two trends.
Read more at National Center for Atmospheric Research/University Corporation for Atmospheric Research
Image: An analysis of rainfall measured at weather stations across the globe between 1999 and 2014 found that the median time it took for half of a year's precipitation to fall was just 12 days. A quarter of annual precipitation fell in just six days, and three-quarters fell in 27 days. (Credit: ©UCAR. Image: Simmi Sinha.)
