artlover Loc: NM

Many areas in SW are under heavy rain alerts. Some areas are in rural sections. Unincorperated areas that get no help!

Even in 100K populated areas have private streets w/o service. We get 15 minutes of heavy down pours. I call it "15 minutes of FRAIN".

Creeks & small & rivers get affected. But what I want to know is this: How do they collect rainfall? At airports & schools?

I am amazed how small the #'s are for pouring water. What kind of containers are used?

Tet68survivor Loc: Pomfret Center CT

You can buy anyone of several types of rain gauges, tube type (I like the 2" dia.) and electronic, which I have also. Radio Shack, Lowes, Home Depot, garden stores like Walmart, Kmart etc. from $10 to several hundred dollar. If your going to spend the bucks get a complete weather station, $100 up!

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

Many are electronic collectors an some have the old fashion glass tube

ntonkin Loc: western Upper Peninusla of Michigan

Rainfall amounts are expressed as inches of rain per hour, or inches of rain for a total rain event or portion thereof. One inch per hour is the lower boundary marker for really paying attention to "heavy rain", and several hours of an inch per hour is cause for serious concern in most places. In deserts, the natural system of dry lake beds and arroyos helps accumulate and store large rainfalls until they percolate into the ground, but also can create their own hazards to humans. The NWS has a nationwide system of gauges, frequently at emergency management centers, sheriff's offices, places like that, where the rain is officially measured and tallied using a standardized rain gauge. We belong to a nationwide voluntary cooperative precipitation measuring organization not affiliated formally with the NWS--CoCoRaHS-- that utilitizes a standard 4 inch diameter clear acrylic rain gauge to collect precipitation--rain in the warm seasons, icy precipitation and snow in the winter. "CoCoRaHS" is an acronym for "Community Collaborative Rain Hail and Snow" and is indicative of what CoCoRaHS is, a voluntary group of people all over North America who take the time each day to record what precipitation did or did not accumulate in the last 24 hours. We do not live in a dryland area, so we are not conversant with all the dryland ins and outs of water measurement. But we do know there are also "acre inches" ad "acre feet" in water measurement in dryland areas, that is a measurement of the depth of water that would cover an acre of land one inch deep, or one foot deep. This may be mostly an irrigation data measurement.

I know that the NWS office in Phoenix has a good online presentation on the American Monsoon. I also know that the National Drought Monitor and National Drought Mitigation Center have good information on water measuring and water issues in the Plains and Southwest.

If you find the idea of CoCoRaHS interesting, the online site can be found at www.cocorahs.org. You can find info on buying rain gauges on the website, and lots of power point presentations on how rain is measured and how the measurements are recorded. The NWS finds CoCoRaHS data to be useful, in fact, they get my data in Marquette NWS as soon as I put it in the database, but it is not "official" NWS data.

Leo Perez

I remember Radio Shack......

Tet68survivor Loc: Pomfret Center CT

Monsoons are when it rains 24" in 8 hours, I will try to post a picture from my time in Vietnam in '68.

artlover Loc: NM

Thanks

artlover Loc: NM

Here in the SW (AR-NM-TX) we have what they call: monsoon season (June thru Sept).

artlover Loc: NM

Not AR but AZ.