UAE weather: Rain could be on the way this week

The temperatures might be feeling a bit Oppenheimer-y outside at the moment but cooling respite could be on the way. We stress the words ‘could be’, weather forecasting is notoriously as much best-guess-work as it is cold science.

These precipitation predictions come straight from the offices of the National Centre of Meteorology, whose latest bulletin includes the exciting prospect of “a chance of some convective clouds formation, maybe accompanied with rainfall by afternoon” for Tuesday.

It’s not a huge amount to go on, and there’s no specified area for the potential sky crying – but it’s a chance and we’re taking it.

Summer rains are a relatively common event in the UAE, in that they happen most years. They often come to us via the medium of those convective (from heating of water bodies) clouds mentioned above, and the country can also catch the tail end of monsoons originating in India.

Quite understandably, these sorts of rains are traditionally seen as a blessing in this region.

And it’s not just rain. Hailstones have been known to ‘hammer out a warning’ all over this land in the summer too. But why?

Hail, those frozen little pellets of water, normally forms inside the storm-signalling fluffy cumulonimbus clouds. The same ones that are formed from convection. This means that we’ll only usually see hailstones in the UAE summertime as part of an intense storm.

محمية المرموم #دبي #المركز_الوطني_للأرصاد #أمطار #أصدقاء_المركز_الوطني_للأرصاد #حالة_الطقس #حالة_جوية #هواة_الطقس pic.twitter.com/eIHsYiyajo

— المركز الوطني للأرصاد (@NCMUAE) October 3, 2022

And what about cloud seeding, are there opportunities here? Potentially. The problem is that not all clouds are suitable for cloud seeding, or rather cloud seeding is vastly less effective with some forms of cloud. The optimal conditions for a spot of seeding are temps of between -12ºC to -10ºC, along with a low wind speed. Meaning that clouds formed in mountainous regions are often the ideal vectors.

The Monday to Friday forecast suggests we can expect more cloudy humid weather, with highs of up to 48ºC and a maximum relative humidity of around 85 per cent, peaking in the early morning. So if you were planning to wear grey, we’d suggest maybe put a pin in that.

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