Record-Breaking Dry 19 Months for Antigua
Black Immigrant Daily News
Dale Destin
The past 19 months is the driest such period on record for Antigua, dating back to at least 1928. Since the deluge of November 2020, December 2020 to June 2022 has yielded only a meagre 983.5 mm (38.72 in), for the island-average rainfall.
This broke the record set for a similar period, December 2014 to June 2016, of 994.4 mm (39.15 in), which was also the record lowest for any consecutive 19 months.
Usually, 19 months ending June averages 1656.3 mm (65.21 in).
This means that since December 2020 only 59 percent of the normal amount of rain fell. The 19-month total of 983.5 mm is less than that for 17 full years.
The rainfall total for the last 19 months was less than what usually falls in 12 months – annually.
Rainfall total for Dec 2020-Jun 2022 – 983.5 mm (38.72 in) vs the normal total for the same period – 1656.3 mm (65.21 in). December 2020 to June 2022 is the driest 19 months on record.
Such an extremely low rainfall total for the last 19 months has a less than a 1 percent chance of occurring – 0.8 percent.
This translates to the dryness for December 2020 to June 2022 having a return period of 1-in-125 years, on average.
It is unlikely that anyone alive has seen this kind of scant rainfall before and there is a less than 10 percent chance of a repeat in the next 13 years.
The last time we saw such dryness we were in the midst of the Great Drought of 2013-2016. At no time during that dearth of rainfall was the dryness this intense for any successive 19 months.
A lot of the dryness seems largely due to dry and dusty air from the Sahara Desert and or cooler than normal sea surface temperatures across the tropical North Atlantic Ocean. The high number of tropical cyclones in 2021 likely contributed, by steering clear of the area and pulling moisture away from the islands.
The dryness has been quite robust. Not only records were set for the last 19 months but also for the last 18, 17, 16 and 15 months respectively. It is also likely that more records will fall in the coming months.
As forecast, it was a drier than normal dry season for Antigua. The period January to June was the 20th driest in a series going back to 1928. The continued below normal rainfall means that drought continues to reign with no predictable end in sight.
With the rainfall at or near record-low levels over the past 19 months, one can appreciate the absence of virtually ALL water from surface catchments and the significant drop in groundwater. Potworks Reservoir, our billion-gallon surface catchment, has been totally dry since late October 2021. If not for water from the increasing number of reverse osmosis plants, “crapo would be smoking our pipes”, at the very least. And for those who say he is smoking our pipes, without the plants, it would be exponentially worse, in unimaginable ways.
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