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The climate of the United States varies due to changes in latitude and a number of geographic features, including mountains and deserts. Gerally, on the mainland, the climate of the US gets warmer the further south one travels and drier the further west one goes until the west coast is reached.

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West of 100°W, much of the US has a cool semi-arid climate in the inland upper western states (Idaho to the Dakotas), to a warm to hot desert and semi-arid climate in the southwestern US east of 100°W, the climate is humid continental in the northern regions (locations roughly above 40°N, Northern Plains, Midwest, Great Lakes, New Gland), transitioning to humid temperate climates from the Southern Plains and lower Midwest to the mid-Atlantic states (Virginia to southern Connecticut).

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A humid subtropical climate is found along and south of a predominantly east-west line from the Virginia/Maryland Capes (north of the greater Norfolk, Virginia area), west to about northern Oklahoma, north of the greater Oklahoma City area. Along the Atlantic coast, a humid subtropical climate zone extends south into central Florida. Along most of the California coast, a Mediterranean climate prevails, while South Florida has a tropical climate, the warmest region on the US mainland.

The higher regions of the Rockies, the Wasatch Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, and the Cascade Range are alpine. The coastal areas of Oregon and Washington have an oceanic climate. The state of Alaska, in the northwestern corner of the North American continent, is dominated by a predominantly subarctic climate, but in the southeast by a subpolar oceanic climate (Alaska Panhandle), the southwestern peninsula and the Aleutian Islands, and a polar climate in the north.

The primary drivers of weather in the contiguous United States are seasonal changes in solar angle, north-south migration of subtropical highs, and seasonal changes in the position of the polar jet stream.

In the Northern Hemisphere summer, subtropical high pressure systems move north and closer to the mainland United States. In the Atlantic Ocean, the Bermuda High creates a south-southwest flow of tropical air masses over the southeastern, southern, and central United States, resulting in warm to hot temperatures, high humidity, and frequent (but usually brief) showers and/or thunderstorms as the afternoon builds up hot. In the Northern Hemisphere summer, high pressure in the Pacific Ocean builds up toward the California coast, resulting in a northwesterly flow of air that creates the cool, dry, and stable weather conditions that prevail along the West Coast during the summer.

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In the Northern Hemisphere winter, the subtropical highs retreat to the south. The polar jet stream (and the associated zone of conflict between cold, dry air masses from Canada and warm, moist air masses from the Gulf of Mexico) descends further south into the United States – bringing more frequent periods of stormy weather with rain, ice and snow and much more variable temperatures, with a rapid rise and fall in temperature is not unusual. However, areas in the southern US (Florida, Gulf Coast, Desert Southwest, and Southern California) often have more stable weather because the impact of the polar jet stream usually does not reach as far south.

Weather systems, whether they are high pressure systems (anticyclones), low pressure systems (cyclones) or fronts (boundaries between air masses of different temperature, humidity and most often both) move faster and in winter/colder. months than in the summer/warmer months when the belt of lows and storms fundamentally moves into southern Canada.

The Gulf of Alaska is the origin of many of the storms that terrorize the United States. Such “North Pacific Lows” cross the US across the Pacific Northwest, progressing eastward across the northern Rockies, northern Great Plains, upper Midwest, Great Lakes, and New Gland states. Across the continental states, “Panhandle hook” storms move from the central Rocky Mountains into the Oklahoma/Texas belt, northeastward toward the Great Lakes, from late fall to spring. They create unusually large temperature contrasts and often bring abundant moisture from the Gulf to the north, sometimes resulting in cold conditions and possibly heavy snow or ice to the north and west of the storm track and warm conditions, heavy rain, and severe thunderstorms to the south and east of the storm track. track – often simultaneously.

Across the northern states in the winter, “Alberta clipper” storms typically track eastward from Montana eastward, bringing light to moderate snowfall from Montana and the Dakotas through the upper Midwest and Great Lakes states to New Gland, often followed by windy and strong arctic outbreaks. When Canadian cold air masses descend unusually far south during the winter, a “Gulf of Mexico low” can develop in or near the Gulf of Mexico, a track to the east or northeast across the southern states or near Gulf or South Atlantic waters. Sometimes they bring rain, but they can bring snow or ice across the south, mostly inland or north.

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During the cold season (generally November to March) most precipitation occurs in association with organized low pressure systems and associated fronts. In summer, thunderstorms are much more localized, with brief thunderstorms common in many areas east of 100°W and south of 40°N.

In the warm season, storm systems affecting a large area are less frequent and weather conditions are more solar-driven, with thunderstorms and severe weather activity most likely during peak heating hours, mostly between 3:00 PM and 9:00 PM local time. Especially from May to August, frequent nocturnal mesoscale-convective system (MCS) thunderstorm complexes, usually associated with frontal activity, can bring significant rainfall to flooding from the Dakotas/Nebraska east through Iowa/Minnesota into the Great Lakes states.

From late summer to fall (mostly August to October), tropical cyclones (hurricanes, tropical storms, and tropical depressions) sometimes approach or cross the Gulf and Atlantic states, bringing strong winds, heavy rainfall, and storm surges (often ending in storm surge) to the lowlands and coastal areas of the Persian Gulf and the Atlantic.

The Southwest has a hot desert climate, at lower elevations. Cities such as Phoix, Las Vegas, Yuma, and Palm Springs have average temperatures over 90°F (38°C) in the summer months and lows in the 70s or 80s. In the winter, daytime temperatures are cooler in the Southwest with highs in the 50s and 60s and lows in the 40s.

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In Phoix, Las Vegas, and similar southwestern desert regions, June is the driest month on average after the end of winter storms from the Pacific and before the onset of the summer “monsoon” in the southwest. The Southwest and Great Basin are affected by the aforementioned Gulf of California monsoon from July to September. This results in some increased humidity and cloud cover, bringing higher overnight low temperatures and localized thunderstorms to the region, which may result in flash flooding. Further east in the desert southwest (Tucson, Arizona east toward El Paso, Texas), winter season precipitation decreases while the summer monsoon increasingly provides maximum precipitation in the summer. For example, El Paso and Albuquerque, New Mexico have significant rainfall peaks from July to September. Nevertheless, the region experiences frequent droughts that often last for years or longer. Wildfires in the western United States (especially the Southwest) occur for many years and can be severe to extreme during particularly hot and dry summers.

Northern Arizona and New Mexico, central and northern Nevada, and most of Utah (except higher mountain areas) have a temperate semi-desert to desert climate, but with colder and snowier winters than on Phoix and similar areas and less hot summers (e.g., in Salt Lake City, Utah). Summer highs often reach the 90s, but lows drop into the low 60s and possibly. 50 years. As in other temperate desert climates, the dry air results in large differences (sometimes over 40 degrees) between daytime highs and nighttime lows. Precipitation, although rare, often falls throughout the year, influenced by both summer storms brought by the southwest monsoon (mainly in the southern regions) and winter storms from the Pacific Ocean.

Coastal California has a Mediterranean climate. Daily high temperatures range from 70 to 80 °F (21 to 27 °C) in summer to 50 to 65 °F (10 to 16 °C) in winter, with lows of 60 °F (16 °C) in summer to mid-40s F in winter.

Like most Mediterranean climates, much of coastal California has wet winters and dry summers. Early summer can often bring cool, cloudy weather (fog and low cloud cover) to coastal California. As such, the hottest summer weather in many areas of the California coast is delayed until August, or September; on average, September is the warmest month in San Francisco. Rising cold Pacific waters also contribute to frequent cool spring and early summer weather in coastal California. In California’s inland river valleys (Bakersfield, Sacramto areas), the wet-winter, dry-summer pattern persists, but the winters are cooler and more prone to occasional freezes or freezes, while the summers are much warmer, with blazing sun and high daily temperatures. less often in the 90s to above 100 °F (38 °C).

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The Gulf and South Atlantic states have a humid subtropical climate with mostly mild winters

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