May 3, 2022

No.157

April 2022
(Back Issues Here)

More rain fell in April than we had for several months.  The transition into the rainy season is well under way.  We had 18.83 inches of rain at the Palmira Arriba Station in April. 

Rainfall for April 2022
Area	Contributors	April 2022	Total 2022
El Salto Arriba	Beth Corwin	9.28	9.94
El Santuario	Robert Boyd	16.09	22.21
El Santuario	Rodrigo Marciacq	14.98	22.21
Barriade Las Flores	Bill Brick	16.32	20.68
Jaramillo Arriba	Steve SarnerS	21.51	26.93
Jaramillo Arriba	Mark Heyer	17.10	22.43
Jaramillo Central	Dave Nichols	18.31	21.31
Jaramillo Abajo	Don Berkowitz	21.34	22.19
Jaramillo Abajo	John McGann	19.56	20.89
Palo Alto	Nancy Pettersen	18.46	31.56
Valle Escondido	Doug Remsen	9.16	9.54
Brisas  Boquetenas	Austin Perry	26.30	26.73
Brisas  Boquetenas	Dennis DeCorte	n/a	n/a
Brisas Boquetenas	Richard Sturtz	29.26	30.56
Los Molinos	Sela Burkholder	25.87	28.13
El Encanto (Volcancito)	Brian Baldwin	11.68	12.99
Cerro Verde (Volcancito)	Charlotte Lintz	n/a	n/a
Santa Lucia	Paula Litt	17.35	18.85
Caldera	Chris Mccall	26.62	27.75
Lucero	Michael Mullin	n/a	n/a
Boquete Country Club	Paul Arrandale	14.54	15.11
Palmira Abajo	Betty Gray	17.31	17.31
Palmira Arriba	Lloyd Cripe	18.83	19.40
El Banco	Laura Daniels	24.19	28.64

The reports from around the District of Boquete for April 2022 indicate the same. More rain. Remember a month ago when were concerned that things were really dry.  They were, but no more! We will soon be complaining of gloomy skies and mildew!

Richard Sturtz reported 29.26 inches for April at Brisas Boquetenas.  Chris Mccall reports 26.62 inches in the Caldera area.  Sela Burkholder reports 25.87 inches in Los Molinos.  Steve Sarner reports 25.51 inches in Jaramillo Arriba. Don Berkowitz reports 21.34 in Jaramillo Abajo. Lots of rain and many reporting that it was the rainiest April they have measured.

At the Palmira Arriba Station we recorded 18.83 inches of rain for April. This is the most rain that I have recorded in 16 years.  Over that span of this time the April rains have averaged 7.34 inches and ranged between 0.28 and 18.83 inches with a standard deviation of 5.80 inches.  This years April rains are 1.90 standard deviations above the mean.  Here are the numbers:

Palmira Arriba Station Rainfall April over 16 Years

You can also look at the tables in the Climate Section to see what rains we had in various months over the course of the last 15 years as well as check the other weather variables. Here is a link to a graph of the monthly rainfall over the 15 years.

The rainy season has truly begun. The plants are smiling again. The coffee plants have bloomed and little tiny cherries are starting to form. Our grass which always turns brown during the dry season (we don't water it to conserve water) is now back to a solid vibrant dark green. This is just the beginning! Won't be long before the fungi start plaguing the coffee leaves.

The latest ENSO Cycle Report is saying that "La Niña is present. Equatorial sea surface temperatures (SSTs) are below average across most of the Pacific Ocean. The tropical Pacific atmosphere is consistent with La Niña. La Niña is favored to continue through the Northern Hemisphere summer (59% chance during June-August 2022), with a 50-55% chance through the fall."

The continuation of La Niña probably means a longer stronger hurricane season. It affects weather significantly in the U.S. (see page 31 of the report and this recent article in The Washington Post). 

Here is a link to a source for a better 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 also want to mention again 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 45%+ probability of above average levels of precipitation for the months of May-June-July 2022 (light-green).

 

ETESA's hydrology and meteorology section is predicting that Chiriqui will have above average levels of precipitation during May of 2022. June and July is predicted to be at about normal levels. You can read their report and check out the details in the "documents" section at this link.

You can 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 get a daily notifications of the report.  You practice your Spanish skills by watching it!

In April, the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) published the Working Group III report on Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change. This is the third part of the IPCC 6th Assessment Report on Climate Change. Here is a link to a short video about the recent report. I think the IPCC is the most authoritative voice regarding the facts of climate change.  I highly recommend reading their reports and supporting political leaders implementing their recommendations.       

The alignment of the complex mirror system of the James Web Telescope is successfully completed. It is now in the Instrument Commissioning phase which will take a couple of months and then it will be ready to begin its scientific work. Your can follow the NASA news about it here. This is one of the most amazing scientific engineering accomplishments of our era. 

On April 26 at 04:30, I got up for a visit to the bathroom and looked out the upstairs southeast facing window and saw the moon and 4 aligned planets (Jupiter, Venus, Mars, Saturn).  It was quite a sight.  Here is a sky map of what it looked like. I read about possibly seeing this earlier in the month but the sky was too cloudy to see them. I was happy to see this beautiful conjunction at this later date. One of the advantages of getting older and having to get up in the night is that you never know what you might encounter!

 

 I came across this very interesting animation last month and thought you might also like to take a look at it.  A Mind-blowing animation of the true-scale of the solar system. It not only shows the scaled sizes of the planets, sun and moon but also their rotation cycles.  

COVID INFORMATION

MONITORING CORONAVIRUS STATUS LINKS 

COVID is still with us and it is still uncertain what it is going to do.  At the moment the worldometer reports 514,446,779 cases of COVID worldwide with 6,264,645 deaths and 469,003,610 recovered cases.  The USA has 83,193,750 total cases with 1,021,247 total deaths and 80,768,595 recovered cases. Imagine 6,264,645 dead human beings in the world (most probably an underestimation) and 1,1,021,247 of the dead human beings are from the United States. While progress has been made in trying to control these, we are still not not completely out of the woods with COVID. More of us need to get fully vaccinated and we all should continue the recommended precautions by qualified public health officials. We need to cooperate and work together on this.  

Sandra and I are headed to Oaxaca, Mexico Friday to spend over a week celebrating our 60th wedding anniversary.  We got married when we were 19 years old.  I will let you figure out how old we are now.  We have experienced a lot of different weather together but fortunately we have had many sunny days. We are fortunately still enjoying our journey together and still in love despite some cloudy and rainy days. We don't have any secrets for a long happy marriage. I think we were just plain lucky to find each other. Here in Palmira, we expect more rainy days in May, but heck, when you are madly in love who cares?  And for awhile we will be in Mexico.  Of course we have our umbrellas locked and loaded for our return!     

Lloyd Cripe

lcripe@boqueteweather.com