February 3, 2022

No.154

January 2022
(Back Issues Here)

We had very little precipitation in January.  It is definitely the dry season.  We had 0.12 inches of rain at the Palmira Arriba Station.  The reports from around the District of Boquete for January indicate low rainfall throughout the district typical of the Dry Season.

Rainfall for January 2022
Area	Contributors	January 2022	Total 2022
El Salto Arriba	Beth Corwin	0.00	0.00
El Santuario	Robert Boyd	0.40	0.40
El Santuario	Rodrigo Marciacq	1.52	1.52
Barriade Las Flores	Bill Brick	0.91	0.91
Jaramillo Arriba	Steve Sarner	1.41	1.41
Jaramillo Arriba	Mark Heyer	1.06	1.06
Jaramillo Central	Dave Nichols	0.29	0.29
Jaramillo Abajo	Don Berkowitz	0.14	0.14
Jaramillo Abajo	Bobi McGann	0.20	0.21
Palo Alto	Nancy Pettersen	2.68	2.68
Valle Escondido	Doug Remsen	0.38	0.38
Brisas  Boquetenas	Austin Perry	0.03	0.03
Brisas  Boquetenas	Dennis DeCorte	0.69	0.69
Brisas Boquetenas	Richard Sturtz	0.66	0.66
Los Molinos	Sela Burkholder	1.45	1.45
El Encanto (Volcancito)	Brian Baldwin	0.16	0.16
Cerro Verde (Volcancito)	Charlotte Lintz	0.20	0.20
Santa Lucia	Paula Litt	0.06	0.06
Caldera	Chris Mccall	0.49	0.49
Lucero	Michael Mullin	0.00	0.00
Boquete Country Club	Paul Arrandale	0.08	0.08
Palmira Abajo	Betty Gray	0.00	0.00
Palmira Arriba	Lloyd Cripe	0.12	0.12
El Banco	Laura Daniels	1.42	1.42

The lowest rainfalls recorded for January 2022 were reported by Beth Corwin at El Salto Arriba, Betty Gray at Palmira Abajo and by Michael Mullin at Lucero with 0.00 inches. Can't get any lower than that!

The highest rainfall was reported by Nancy Pettersen at Palo Alto with 2.68 inches.  Palo Alto often reports more moisture in the dry season due to the Bajareque blowing into the north end of Boquete from the Caribbean side of the mountain range.

At the Palmira Arriba Station we recorded 0.12 inches of rain in January. About an eighth of an inch.  Is this lower than normal for this time of the year during the dry season? 

The following chart shows the statistics for the month of January from the years 2007 thru 2021 for the Palmira Arriba Station.  The mean rainfall for the month of January is 0.69 inches with a standard deviation of 0.89 inches with a range from 0.00 to 3.18 inches.  The rain for January 2022 is less than a standard deviation below the mean (0.64sd) so it is within the normal range. 

Palmira Arriba Station Rainfall January over 15 Years

The following graph shows the amount of rain in January from the year 2007 through the year 2021:

 

You can tell from looking at this graph, that January is usually a low rain month of the Dry Season and there have been several years of no rain (only 0.0 inches) in the month of January.

You can also look at the tables in the Climate Section to see what rains we have had in various months over the course of the last 15 years as well as check the other weather variables.

Bottom line is:  We are solidly into the dry season and January had basically normal precipitation.

The latest ENSO Cycle Report is saying that "La Niña is present. Equatorial sea surface temperatures (SSTs) are below average across the eastcentral and eastern Pacific Ocean. The tropical Pacific atmosphere is consistent with La Niña. La Niña is likely to continue into the Northern Hemisphere spring (67% chance during March-May 2022) and then transition to ENSO-neutral (51% chance during April-June 2022)." If you check out the report, you will see near the end the U.S. seasonal outlooks which are affected by the ENSO.

Here is a link to a source for understanding El Niño.  If you need some help with this, give this a read and you will learn a lot about this important weather phenomenon.

I want to again mention an excellent understandable presentation about El Niño and the ENSO by Mel Strong in his Introduction to Weather and Climate Short Course available on YouTube. I highly recommend this presentation and the entire course. If you listen to just the one lecture on El Niño, you will more clearly understand the ENSO (El Niño Southern Oscillation) system and how it generally affects world weather. He is an exceptional teacher and I find all his lectures in the course to be very informative and uniquely understandable.

The IRI (International Research Institute for Climate and Society) (select South America from the Region menu) is predicting that most of Panama will have a 40%+ probability of above normal levels of precipitation for the months of February-March-April 2022 (very light green areas).

ETESA's hydrology and meteorology section is predicting that Chiriqui will have about average levels of precipitation in most areas during December of 2021 through February of 2022. You can read their report and check out the details for Chiriqui in the "documents" section at this link.

ETESA recently issued a Bulletin regarding Climate Predictions for February 2022. They are basically predicting that we will have normal levels of precipitation.

In case you aren't aware of it, you can also watch a daily video report of Panama weather conditions at the ETESA website or on YouTube.  Here is the link to their YouTube Channel.  If you click the Subscribe button you can get a daily notifications of the report.  You can practice your Spanish skills by watching it!

The incredible James Webb Telescope arrived at its L2 Orbit a million miles from earth on January 24, 2022.  Your can read all about it here.  It is now in the process of aligning its 18 mirrors that will work in unison to collect the light for viewing.  Here is another good video about the alignment of the mirrors. I remain in awe at this scientific engineering project. So far all has gone well with the Webb project. Wow!

On January 18 at 17:20 hours cumulus clouds were building up in the distant southeast along with a rainbow to the east as the sun was moving downward in the west.  It was a special moment. Here is an iPhone photo of the moment from our patio:

(click on image to enlarge)

COVID INFORMATION

MONITORING CORONAVIRUS STATUS LINKS 

At the moment the worldometer reports 392,450,892 cases of COVID worldwide with 5,746,705 deaths and 310,955,506 recovered cases.  The USA has 77,502,221 total cases with 924,566 total deaths and 47,576,077 recovered cases. Imagine 5,746,705 dead human beings in the world (most probably an underestimation) and 924,566 of the dead human beings are from the United States. That is a lot of dead people and a very serious matter. This is not just some ordinary flu year.  Despite these hard facts, I still come across people who think this is no big deal and they think that wearing masks and getting vaccinated is driven by some sort of governmental conspiracy and it is an infringement of their personal freedoms to cooperate, fall-in-line, and get vaccinated. Such thinking is sheer folly and a stance that is at the height of foolish narcissism and rebellion. I truly don't understand this behavior. This is a public health matter and not a political matter.  It is no infringement of personal rights to join together and cooperate for the good of all. That's why we have driver's licenses, wear seatbelts, drive on the required side of the road, and get vaccinated for smallpox (etc.) because responsible government has had the foresight to help and enforce such important things. Public health requires that we cooperate and do things together for our well-being and the well-being of the community. This is no time for stubborn rebelliousness. Don't be contrary. Be cooperative. Some of us humans are contrary enough that we aren't going to do what we need or want to do because somebody else (especially) the government wants us to do it!  I think this is pure stubbornness and folly. This is a time for group cooperation and not a time for independent contrariness.

Continue to enjoy the good weather and be thankful you are not living in the cold extreme weather up north. Your umbrellas can now take a rest for awhile as we move forward in the Dry Season. This is a good month to climb Baru if you are up to it!

Lloyd Cripe

lcripe@boqueteweather.com