Emirates Meteorology Blog

 Well, here it is: An unusual upper-air trough is going to affect the Arabian Gulf countries with prolonged period of unsettled weather and unusual rain, showers, and thundestorms. The first round will be on the evening of Wednesday Mar 25. Countries affected will include the UAE, parts of Oman, Bahrain, Qatar, and parts of Saudi Arabia.

500mb heights for Thursday Mar 26

This upper-air trough will deepen extensively by mid next week around Mar 31, resulting in a cold front sweeping across Eastern Arabian Gulf.

Meanwhile, abundant moisture will be available during this period. This will trigger showers and thunderstorms.

Precipitation forecast

According to Jim Andrews (Accuweather forecaster):

 ”In the South West, the thing that first catches the eye is the potential for an outbreak of rain with thunderstorms over the eastern Khaleej, mostly for UAE, northern Oman and SE Iran. This would be, at least to start, on Wednesday into Thursday.

The trigger for the likely rain outbreak will stem from building heat over southern Arabia and a strong southwesterly jet stream farther north. Linked to the jet stream, a cold front will settle southeastward to central Arabia through southern Iran at midweek.

Further outbreaks of showers and thunderstorms are indicated by the GFS for the last days of the week owing in at least part to the diving southeastward into Iraq of an upper-atmospheric trough”

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Meanwhile, on Monday March 24 the UAE East coast received a flooding 80mm of rain in less than 6 hours. This happened the day after a short period of clouds and drizzle in the UAE.

More photos here and here .