Miami Weather: Bring Back Our Sweet Sunshine

MIAMI, FL — Do you remember when Miami was sunny? When it rained on one side of the street but not the other? We miss those days and took great pride in calling our friends and families around the country to gloat about them, especially in the winter. But now they seem a distant memory like "Miami Vice" and Jackie Gleason.

With the sound turned down, Local 10 chief meteorologist Betty Davis looked like she was trying to explain a children's Halloween drawing on Tuesday as she waved her hand around a map of what used to be the Miami area, now covered in orange, green, yellow and red blotches. (Sign up for our free Daily Newsletters and Breaking News Alerts for the Miami Patch.)

Patch contacted the National Weather Service on Tuesday with the question that everybody has been asking since last week — before we could have possibly known it was time to start building the ark.

When is our next beach day?

"There could be a few hours here and there maybe on Friday or Saturday," meteorologist Andrew Hagen, with the National Weather Service in Miami told Patch on Tuesday afternoon. "It could be a couple of hours one of those days where it's like okay, in certain areas of South Florida. But maybe only mostly cloudy and not raining instead of overcast and raining."

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A flood watch has been extended until 2 a.m. Thursday for the Miami area. The advisory means there is a greater potential for flooding.

Even Miami Dolphins rookie guard Isaac Asiata of Utah couldn't help but notice the difference in the rain he experienced in his Beehive State as compared to Miami.

“Miami rain is different than Utah rain," he insisted on Monday after practicing in Davie. "That was a tsunami. That thing was crazy. I’ve never got rained on like that before."

While there is not a small craft advisory in effect, Hagen said that small crafts were being warned to exercise caution on Tuesday with winds that could reach between 15 to 20 knots. The strongest winds were expected to arrive on Wednesday with a moderate chop on the water.

With so much rain, some people are asking why meteorologists still qualify their forecasts with the term "chance" of rain.

"Basically, for northern Miami-Dade they're like 50 to 60 (percent) and then they're like 70 percent in Broward and 70 percent in Palm Beach," Hagan explained on Tuesday looking ahead to Wednesday. "We actually have rain chances between 80 and 90 percent tomorrow during the morning hours for a lot of South Florida. It's basically at 80 percent tomorrow for most periods for the whole day."

Warning Coordination Meteorologist Robert Molleda with the National Weather Service officially proclaimed May 29 the start of rainy season in South Florida.

"It wasn't until Sunday, May 29th when it appeared as if the sea-breeze driven convection was widespread enough over interior areas along with PWs returning to around 1.5", a pattern which has only become more pronounced as the week has progressed," Molleda said in a June 2 email.

"This pattern is somewhat reminiscent of 2011 when we had a very dry May and a late start of the rainy season in early June," Molleda said.

The National Weather Service confirmed that an EF0 tornado touched down in Broward County at 7:07 p.m. on Monday at Sheridan Street and Flamingo Road near Hollywood. That is on the low end of the Fujita scale, meaning that trees were likely to be damaged but not structures.

The good news is that the rain will help ease drought concerns and the likelihood of brush fires, which has been an issue in South Florida and the entire Sunshine State.

"The rains for the most part, these rains are very beneficial for the drought because it was a really dry, dry season," Hagen explained. "We just don't want to get too much rain in too short of a time because then the roads won't be able to handle it."

Photo by Paul Scicchitano