The rain in Guadalajara in the last four days has destroyed old precipitation records – and parts of the city as well.
{Reg}In the first three days of this month – Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday – 93.7mm of rain fell on Guadalajara, which is 15 times more than the February average of 6 mm, according to Angel Meulenert Peña, the director of the Astronomy and Meteorology Institute (IAM) at the University of Guadalajara. In fact, Wednesday’s rainfall of 55.6 mm is almost 20 mm more than the average registered in the wettest February on record, which was in 1968.
Such intense rain has resulted in traffic jams, car accidents in Guadalajara and Zapopan, broken traffic lights, fallen trees, leaking houses in Tlaquepaque, mudslides and flooding, with many streets and overpasses closed. The accidents have totaled almost 200 per day, with the most serious resulting in a woman’s death as two trailers and three vans collided in the San Agustin tunnel.
“What we have seen in these days is not what we have seen in past rainstorms” said Trinidad Lopez Rivas, director of the State Civil Protection Unit. However, for a positive spin, he says the rain has led to a notable rise in the dam levels in Jalisco and according to IAM, it has cleaned the air, sweeping much of the contamination from the atmosphere.{/reg}
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