![]() The change from dry to wet was swift and visibly striking. “Until 10 days ago, north-central Chile was experiencing one of its driest winters,” said René Garreaud, a scientist at the University of Chile. According to news reports, the storms left hundreds of people stranded in a mountain pass, where more than 1 meter (3 feet) of snow accumulated on the roads. Two weather systems-on July 9–10 and July 14–15-dumped rain along the coast and snow in mountains. The storms were the result of a blocking anticyclone atmospheric pattern near the Antarctic Peninsula that steered several extratropical cyclones toward Chile. ![]() The precipitation brought at least some temporary relief to an area suffering a decade-long drought. Heavy rain and snow fell in the area despite La Niña conditions offshore in the Pacific that typically bring dry winters. The blanket of fresh snow along the mountain range between Chile and Argentina is visible in the image above, acquired on July 16 by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite. In July 2022, back-to-back weather systems eased rainfall deficits in central Chile and added to the snowpack atop the Andes-a critical reserve of water for the coming summer. As extreme summer heatwaves deepened droughts and fueled wildfires in the Northern Hemisphere, winter storms brewed south of the equator.
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