Weather in Iraq.

[David Draun]

This has got to be the most boring weather pattern in the world right now. You all can complain about heat ridges, convective inhibition, caps, and moisture deprivation all you want, but I think I've got it the worst right now. These hot, cloudless days are a broken freaking record around here, and they're supposed to get worse as summer wears on. Hot, hot hot, slightly cooler with wind and dust, then it starts all over again.

However, I'd like to see an atmospheric sounding for this area. If anyone knows where I could see one, I would greatly appreciate it. With all this heat, there has got to be some instability, some measure of CAPE. I know where the big fat cap is, you can see it in the morning around sunrise. It shows itself as a thick layer of airborne dust sitting just a few hundred feet off the ground. Just a thought.

 

[Glenn Rivers]

Weather in Iraq

David, have you ever tried looking at NOAA's READY page? (http://www.arl.noaa.gov/ready.html. Using this page you can create model (GFS) model forecast soundings, and I think you can also look up international soundings. The WMO has a 5 digit code for upper air sounding locations around the world. I only found one listing for Iraq (40648) "Habbaniya". I would guess that any others in Iraq would start with (40***).

Just for an experiment, I found the Current Meteorology world map on READY and pointed the cursor over the "sand box" of western Iraq and got a forecast sounding for 18 UTC (18 H GFS forecast). I have not figured out how to paste pictures or graphics in this forum, but the sounding I got started around 950 mb, had a surface temp of 103, a dew of 32 and was dry adiabatic up to 600 - 550 mb. The mixing ratio in this ~ 13,000 foot thick mixed layer was nearly steady at 4g/kg dropping off sharply at the top, where there was an inversion of absolute temp. I determined that there was no CAPE in any part of sounding except the tiny amount that you would get from the super adiabatic layer near the ground. The lifted condensation level was higher than the mixed layer, so there would be no surface based Cumulus (if this sounding did verify).

The shallow layer of dust that you describe in the mornings probably demarcates the shallow nocturnal inversion, which quickly mixes out in the morning, allowing a deep mixed layer to reach 10,000 - 15,000 feet AGL during the course of the day.

I hope that this helps. Good luck and stay safe.

 

[David Draun]

Well, that is great. This atmosphere is definitely more stable then Iraq's political system, lol. Thanks for the URL. I will definitely bookmark it for when the rains come in October.