More than meets the eye with weather

Yuma conditions have been interesting lately

Few things grab Yumans’ attention faster than wacky weather. And boy, there’s been no shortage of that lately. First we had the remnants of Hurricane Rosa, which brought close to 2 inches of rain to our region over two days, according to the National Weather Service.

That in and of itself was strange, since annually, we only get roughly 3 inches of rain total. Then, there was a twister in the sky Saturday about 10 miles north of Fortuna Foothills near Highway 95, or 14 miles northwest of Ligurta.

Officials with the weather service confirmed the event, noting that the tornado formed at about 5:22 p.m. Saturday, and it was a weak one, with winds under 80 miles an hour.

Now, that’s not something we hear about every day here.

Dust devils? Of course. Those are a common occurrence. We even get the occasional dust storm or haboob. But tornadoes? The weather service says Yuma County likely sees maybe one or two tornadoes a year – which again, who knew?

Scientific American notes that dust devils and tornadoes are in fact two very different events. Dust devils form under slightly different processes, during relatively dry conditions, when the sun heats the ground, and when the winds are light. It’s essentially rising hot air, according to a CBS report. Dust devils don’t get nearly as big or destructive as tornadoes do.

A tornado, on the other hand, is a column of air that forms from the base of a storm cloud and connects to the Earth’s surface below, Britannica reports.

While we’re on the subject of weather, the weather service shared an interesting bit of information last week. Phoenix had 128 days of 100-degree-plus weather this year – ranking it the third highest total of 100-degree-plus days since 1896.

Yuma, on the other hand, only had 122 days over 100 – a number that ties for 28th place since 1878. Our record was set in 1952 with 144 days over 100, followed by 1989 (142 days) and 1958 (139 days).

However, Yuma averages 109 days a year of 100 degree or warmer weather, while Phoenix averages 93 days a year.

People might just think of Yuma as a place that is hot. But when we look a little closer, there’s often something interesting going on with the weather here!

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