The trade winds that brought Columbus and countless other seafarers to these shores over the centuries soon will bring rain, too. Any day now, the experts say. While it may be small comfort to the Tampa Bay homeowner watching his lawn turn to straw, it's true that the meteorological components of Florida's summer rainy season are just about in their proper places.
Somebody cue the thunder, please.
And for that, we need help from the Atlantic Ocean, and from one of the regular players in Florida's annual hurricane drama, the Bermuda high. The Bermuda high is an area of high pressure that moves north from near the Equator and settles roughly in the vicinity of Bermuda about this time of year. Moist sea air swings around this ridge of pressure in a clockwise pattern, ultimately passing over Florida. These are the so-called trade winds that European explorers followed to the Caribbean for hundreds of years. The wet Atlantic air is a start, but there's no rain until it collides with the sea breezes headed in the opposite direction from the Gulf of Mexico.