Shafaq News – Baghdad

Iraq’s prolonged dry weather and lack of rainfall this autumn stem from five key atmospheric factors, the Meteorological and Seismic Authority said on Sunday.

In a statement, the agency said that despite several weeks of the fall season, Iraq’s weather remains “stable and dry,” with rain limited to parts of the northern region.

According to the authority, the first reason is the dominance of a subtropical high-pressure system, caused by descending air masses around 30° latitude in the northern hemisphere — part of the global Hadley circulation — which leads to dry and stable conditions across much of Iraq.

The second factor is the absence of Mediterranean low-pressure systems, as no active cold fronts have moved eastward toward Iraq this season. The northern jet stream remains positioned over Turkiye and the Levant, confining rainfall to those areas.

Third, persistent surface heat has kept temperatures high across central and southern Iraq, reducing the temperature contrast needed to generate atmospheric instability.

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Fourth, low upper-level humidity in the 700 and 500 millibar layers prevents effective cloud formation, even when minor surface disturbances occur.

Finally, the authority described October as a “seasonal transition period”, a typically stable phase between summer and winter before active rain systems begin forming in early November.