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Summer monsoon rain over eastern New Mexico. The North American monsoon, variously known as the Southwest monsoon, the Mexican monsoon, the New Mexican monsoon, or the Arizona monsoon [1] is a term for a pattern of pronounced increase in thunderstorms and rainfall over large areas of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico.
The major monsoon systems of the world consist of the West African, Asian–Australian, the North American, and South American monsoons. The term was first used in English in British India and neighboring countries to refer to the big seasonal winds blowing from the Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea in the southwest bringing heavy rainfall to the area.
Within the United States, it affects Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, West Texas, and California. The North American monsoon is known to many as the Summer, Southwest, Mexican or Arizona monsoon. [27] [28] It is also sometimes called the Desert Monsoon as a large part of the affected area is desert.
Texas' weather varies widely, from arid in the west to humid in the east. The huge expanse of Texas encompasses several regions with distinctly different climates: Northern Plains, Trans-Pecos Region, Texas Hill Country, Piney Woods, and South Texas. Generally speaking, the eastern half of the state is humid subtropical, while the western half ...
Buran (a wind which blows across eastern Asia. It is also known as Purga when over the tundra); Karakaze (strong cold mountain wind from Gunma Prefecture in Japan); East Asian Monsoon, known in China and Taiwan as meiyu (梅雨), in Korea as jangma (), and in Japan as tsuyu (梅雨) when advancing northwards in the spring and shurin (秋霖) when retreating southwards in autumn.
The terrain of western Texas in the Southwest is the flat, rolling land of the plains, which eventually turns into a desert with some hills. There are significant mountains as well in west Texas upon reaching the Trans-Pecos area. Chihuahuan Desert terrain near Carlsbad. The term "High Desert" is also synonymous with this region.
Texas is approximately bisected by a series of faults that trend southwest to northeast across the state, from the area of Uvalde to Texarkana.South and east of these faults, the surface exposures consist mostly of Cenozoic sandstone and shale strata that grow progressively younger toward the coast, indicative of a regression that has continued from the late Mesozoic to the present.
Together, those factors mean that the heat capacity of the layer involved in the seasonal cycle is much larger over the oceans than over land, meaning that the air over the land warms faster and reaches a higher temperature than the air over the ocean. The hot air over the land tends to rise, creating an area of low pressure.