PHOENIX — It's been 147 days without any measurable rain in Phoenix.
But we know it's rained, 12News has shown you pictures and video. So how can we still be so dry more than halfway through monsoon?
It's because the "official" rain gauge for Phoenix is located at Sky Harbor International Airport – where it's been bone dry for months.
“Four instances of traces this year," National Weather Service Meteorologist Sean Benedict said. "So came close but just haven't measured.”
The National Weather Service does take in measurements from all around the Valley and combines them to figure out how much rain has fallen throughout the region. But when it comes to official reporting for the city, the Sky Harbor sensor is it.
Physically, the sensor is a bucket. It's a fancy bucket with sensors and extras to make it more accurate, but in the end...it's basically a bucket.
It fills up with rain and the weight of the rain can show NWS meteorologists how much rain has fallen.
“We try not to move it around too much and keep it in same general location," Benedict said. "But it's been at Sky Harbor since 1953."
And that's why it's still there, instead of being moved to a more central part of Phoenix, or a part where people actually live: because it's always been there.
Benedict said if they moved the sensor, it would mess up decades worth of weather data. Predictions are only as good as the data they have, and the data has to stay consistent.
“The downfalls of a single location is it's not always gonna get hit, so it's not necessarily always representative of the whole entire city," Benedict said.
The record for a dry spell in Phoenix is 160 days. The NWS is optimistic that Sky Harbor might see rain in the next few days.
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