How do we know where it's going to rain? Sounds like a silly question, but is it? We all make plans and we want to be able to have some fun and then it rains!! One vacation I can remember taking with my family was a trip to the state of Washington. We loaded our bikes, our kayaks, our hiking shoes, tents and pillows! It was going to be 2 weeks of fun under the sun! Well, it turned out to be the worst vacation ever. Rained everyday and we spent our mornings sitting IHop waiting for the rain to stop.... I love pancakes, and I gained about 10 pounds... Anyway, as it turns out, Washington gets TONS of rain, all the time!! If I had known that, I would have voted to go to Death Valley instead! It rarely rains there, and why is that?? The Earth has three basic climate zones that are drawn up using latitude lines on a map. They are arctic zones, tropical zones and temperate zones. The tropics have the most weather and precipitation because they get direct rays of sunlight all year round. The temperate zones receive angled sunlight so their climate fluctuates. Washington is in that temperate zone....and the coast of Washington is backed by the Cascade mountains. In the spring and summer moist air masses travel west and as they bump into the cascade mountains they release their moisture as they are pushed up the mountainside. Washington is on the windward side of the Cascades. The above picture of Seattle, Washington is not from my vacation, it is a picture of how nice it can be in the summer in Washington... In Death Valley the average rainfall is 2 inches per year and there is super high evaporation rate. It truly is a desert, arid, dry and deadly. The reason this place is dry is because of the rain shadow effect. Those Sierra Nevada mountains keep storms from raining on Death Valley. When storms come in the only direction the storm can go is up. As it climbs higher into the atmosphere, the cloud cools, dumps its moisture and drys out. As the clouds pass over the top of the Sierras, they are light, puffy cumulus clouds, or completely evaporated into wisps of water vapor. Death Valley is known to have some pretty cool dust devils though....
Basically precipitation at different latitudes is caused by the tilt of the Earth. Heat energy lessens as you travel north or south from the equator. The Sun's rays are less direct as we travel toward the poles. Next time I plan a vacation I need to keep in mind that daily weather can spoil my fun, and climate is a better way to understand what type of fun can be had in a certain place. That means if I want warm and sunny I should head toward the equator and not mind a few rain squalls each day. If I go north, it's going to be cooler and the weather more unpredictable. So I've got it! I know exactly where to go for vacation!
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Mrs. TaylorI love science! Everything about the world is interesting and never boring. I love to study plants, animals, insects, and people. My favorite subjects are my students who are the most unique organisms on the planet! Categories |