Post Tropical Rains Flood Deserts And Mountains In Southwest

The desert Southwest is not looking so dry this weekend. Remnants of tropical storm Priscilla arrived on Friday and have led a path that stretched from Nevada up to the southwest corner of Colorado.

Meteorologist intern Miriam Guthrie said, “Parts of the Southwest saw significant rainfall totals, where many places broke their daily record rainfall totals, other places saw multiple months of rainfall in just days.”

Las Vegas saw flooded streets on Friday night as Harry Reid Airport registered 0.92 inches of rain. That’s roughly triple what the area sees on average for the entire month of October. It was also the fourth wettest calendar day in October.

Numerous water rescues have been reported around Phoenix Sunday morning due to heavy rain. Up to 2.5 inches of rain has fallen in the area through mid-Sunday morning, and the city saw 0.70 inches of rainfall on Saturday alone. This is several months' worth of rainfall in just a couple of days.

Grand Junction, CO also saw more than 2 inches of rain, setting daily rainfall records on both Friday and Saturday. Hundreds were ordered to evacuate from the Vallecito Creek area north of Durango, where overflowing mountain streams put homes at risk.