I am studying seasonal rainfall in this region for my PhD and this video encapsulates basically every way in which this region is so dry. Similar to El Nino (and La Nina), the Indian Ocean undergoes a similar type of variability called the IOD (Indian ocean dipole). Occasionally, when SST (sea surface temperature) anomalies are high in the west, such that the water temperature is above average, this can (for a brief period) increase rainfall in east Africa. This typically only occurs in the 'short rains' season from October-December since positive IOD events only tend to occur following boreal summer. positive IOD events increased rainfall in east Africa in short rains 2023 and 2019, bringing flooding and a high impact on the people who live there.

@alexanderconrad669

4 ай бұрын

Why is the rainfall during boreal spring not increased but the rainfall during boreal autumn is? For example in April when the ITC is in east Afrika, only moving in the other direction bringing convection close to potentially warmer ocean waters during El Nino?

@dealingwithkatherine4068

4 ай бұрын

​@@alexanderconrad669 this is because positive IOD events typically begin in boreal summer, so the strong SST anomalies associated with them are at their peak around October alongside the short rains season. For more info I recommend reading Saji et al 1999 "A dipole mode in the tropical Indian Ocean". Variability in the long rains season in the most recent decades is characterised more by La Nina, such that La Nina brings drought during this rainfall season.

@Anoss91

8 күн бұрын

no, sorry. The Sahara was green and full of water 6000 years ago. Life developed there. A few things ravaged everything in a very short time, and it was this devastation that changed the conditions not the other way around, water or no water, you don't create a desert like that, PHD or not, you are wrong.

As a person who lives in Central Somalia 🇸🇴 i always used to ask myself why my country is hot desert while the neighbouring countries aren't. Thanks for explaining this important topic.

@JustinYiseverywhere

6 ай бұрын

Freedom for Ogaden

@user-pm2nv2ck8u

6 ай бұрын

@@JustinYiseverywhere Insha' Allah

@WARLORDDOM

6 ай бұрын

Hahahha Hahahah Ogaden will be free Of Somalia

@Mrbarentsberg

6 ай бұрын

​@@WARLORDDOM the leader of ogedon was assassinated😂😂😂

@user-ko2lp6zb6o

5 ай бұрын

It didn't feel like a desert when I was there. More like savannah ish

Man you went from like 15.000 to now almost 80.000 subscribers in the last three months. Keep uploading a little bit more frequently and you'll boom, your style is very appreciable.

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Thanks, I am completing a teaching certification this year and that takes most of my free time. After I finish it, I'll be able to upload a lot more frequently.

@solomon4554

6 ай бұрын

​@@casualearth9076best of luck to you!

@daltonmiller5590

6 ай бұрын

@@casualearth9076 You're doing exactly what I aim to do in the future. Just started Uni to become a history professor. I've thought about doing KZread videos on the side, but I have no idea where to start. You're a great inspiration! This is the level of quality content I hope to one day begin to create.

@wxcvbndu51

3 ай бұрын

​@@casualearth9076yeah focus on your academic certification for now, that's the most stable path between this and KZread. Still, I'll stay tuned to see what you have coming next!

To keep it close to ten minutes, many details were left out of this video. I’ve studied this topic for many years, so if you have a question (or any climate question) please ask in the comments! Thanks for watching.

@CrispyGFX

6 ай бұрын

Feel free to make these 15, 30, 60 minutes long or more.

@MegaClaymore123

6 ай бұрын

Great video. I wish I studied this sort of thing in university

@dylancooper787

6 ай бұрын

Your channel is exactly what I've been looking for quite some time now. I love learning about the interplay between geological, meteorological, and geographical phenomena. So many channels out there are too superficial, but I don't necessarily want to watch recorded college lectures.. Your channel is the perfect balance. So happy I came across your video on extreme microclimates of elevated sinkholes. Keep up the good work!

@Vativ

6 ай бұрын

@@CrispyGFX pls dont do this, i have a zoomer attention span and 30 minutes is too much

@_helium_

6 ай бұрын

Please feel free to include all of the information you wish. These videos are fantastic. I love your channel!

Hundreds of trees are cut down daily in Somalia and shipped to the UAE as charcoal. The UAE might seem like a first world country but they require charcoal for some reason.

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Yes, a local sea breeze circulation helps to create a belt of scrub and forest a few kilometers inland in part of Somalia. But this unfortunately is a heavily degraded habitat, and most of the country has suffered similar habitat destruction. All of the megafauna adapted to arid Kenya (Grevy's Zebra, Reticulated Giraffe, etc.) were once widespread in Somalia.

@skp8748

6 ай бұрын

That's only down south... Puntland Galmudug and Somaliland have strict laws against it

@mohamedhussein4124

6 ай бұрын

It’s business

@franceshorton918

6 ай бұрын

@casualearth Such a shame that humans will cut down the trees and bush, And Not Plant Replacements. Maybe the people need to live TODAY and have no capacity to think of their children's world tomorrow. Perhaps no one would care for the emergent bush. Allow their hungry animals to graze. Mankind's stewardship of the very environment that could sustain them (and their livestock) is broken. I wonder why this isn't obvious.... ?

@skp8748

6 ай бұрын

@@franceshorton918 illegal trade with UAE who buy from Al shabab

Thanks so much for this video. I have been trying to answer this exact question after doing some research on Dodoma, Tanzania. I could not undertand why this area of Africa is so arid, but now I have an explanation. Keep up the great work :-)

As a Kenyan, I now understand why Kenya has such varied climates from East to West (1000 miles apart), and why the Turkana region has such powerful winds, and also so dry. I get why South Sudan experiences heavy storms and sometimes flooding creating superb pastures, and it totally makes sense. (Maybe the same weather effect influences the South Sudanese height in some way; weather> superb pastures> many cows> lots of milk> calcium in milk helps in bone growth> tall people). Netherlands has a very tall population and they consume a lot of dairy products. And yes, these climatic conditions in Eastern Africa must have played a huge part in human evolution. The East African region is very fascinating to archaeologists because they have found some of the oldest evidence of human activity in this region. Early man must have actively looked for the warm, moderately wet climate of East Africa in order to increase his comfort and his chance of survival.

@neverlookback1244

6 ай бұрын

The pygmies live a few kilometers away in the forests of Central African Republic and they are one of the shortest people

@RazorMureithi

6 ай бұрын

could not have said it better

@lukahkamande6826

6 ай бұрын

I understand why Kengen is planning to create another wind farm in Marsabit county

@meaktooni

6 ай бұрын

North Kenya North itiobia Djibouti somalia land is somaliland 🇸🇴🇸🇴🇸🇴🇸🇴🇩🇯🇩🇯🇩🇯🇩🇯

@kaboonali5466

6 ай бұрын

@@meaktooniwhy are you telling

East africa is fascinating in so many ways. Great video

@jacobdewey2508

6 ай бұрын

So true!

@tedsteiner

6 ай бұрын

The cradle of humanity :)

@torstimyle1355

6 ай бұрын

​@@tedsteiner evolution is illusion

@AliHussein-gv6nh

6 ай бұрын

Somalia 🇸🇴 you meant 😆 ancient land

@joalvarado8506

5 ай бұрын

It’s more fascinating when you realize that one of the world’s major language families originated there. Afro-Asiatic people came from the horn and their early forms of pre-agriculture influenced true agriculture in the Levant some few thousand years later and likely contributed to the drying in the area as well. The Egyptians themselves believed that they and their gods came from the land of Punt.

I really enjoyed this video. Discovering your channel has been a real pleasure this year, I'm realizing how little I know about how physical geography influences weather and climate; I have a history background and it's cool to discover a whole new perspective on natural forces that have shaped human history. Keep up the great work!

On reddit people ask this question all the time and every single comment gives a different explanation for the unusual dryness of the Horn of Africa. This video explains it very well (And I will be posting a link to it whenever the topic comes up again). Truly fascinating. Thank you.

@skp8748

6 ай бұрын

Somali plate... Younger dryas

@solomon4554

6 ай бұрын

@@skp8748 Mount Kilimanjaro, Somali Plateau..

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and Research, you answered all the key points of climate questions that we ask our selves. Lived both Somalia and Kenya 🇸🇴 🇰🇪 experienced this in first hand.

outstanding video. comprehensive, interesting, clarifying, just couldnt stop watching it!

Have you done a video looking at the species that have tiny ranges (

My friend thank you so much for this. I’ve been wondering about this for ages and never got to fully understand it until now. Quality content at its finest, cheers and keep up!

Thanks for explaining this! I am also curious about northeast Brazil. Though not a desert, it has a semiarid climate near Equador and near the Amazon rain forest. It is called the Caatinga region. Hopefully, you could make a video about it one day

@joaovictor536

6 ай бұрын

Yeah! The Brazilian semi-arid is truly an interesting topic to explore

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Yes, the Caatinga is fascinating and it is also near the Atlantic Rainforest on the east coast. Along with the Cerrado, it divides this rainforest from the Amazon. I have written many notes about it and touched on it briefly in my video about primates, but not the climate. My plan was to cover it in at the same time that I cover the lack of hurricanes in the South Atlantic, as these topics fit together.

@everettduncan7543

6 ай бұрын

The southern hemisphere is on average colder than the north, because there is so much more uninterrupted water flow. This causes drier conditions in many areas that had Antarctica still been connected to either Australia or South America would have blocked.

@forgetful3360

6 ай бұрын

Based on radiocarbon dating of potsherds, proponents of historical ecology such as William Denevan and William Balee have suggested that large sections of the Caatinga region may be of anthropogenic origin. Over 1000 years ago, native peoples may have unintentionally created the environment of the modern-day Caatinga through constant slash-and-burn agriculture, thereby stymying plant succession and preventing major rainforests from growing within the region.[7] Conversely, fossil evidence suggests that the Caatinga may historically have been part of a much larger dry belt.[4][5]. Wikipedia

@forgetful3360

6 ай бұрын

The Wikipedia article goes on to describe on going desertification in the region due to overgrazing and tree cutting for firewood etc. For overgrazing, read the same stupid grazing practices of the past 10000 years that have aridified vast regions of formerly productive forest and savannah.

You’re killing it dude. I don’t know anything about weather but you sure have peaked my interests. Best of luck with your channel!

I’m from Somalia and it’s quite arid here. Very low rainfall and droughts most of the time.

@mohamedhussein4124

6 ай бұрын

Northern somalia 🇸🇴 not south somalia is savanna and forest

@shukriiii

6 ай бұрын

In Hargeysa it rained a lot during spring in the year I lived there. What part of Somalia are you in? Only parts of the central region are more desert like.

@kamal-hassan

6 ай бұрын

The north is the most arid region in Somalia with little to no rainfall. Even there's scarcity of water. Puntland and Somaliland regions are the driest.@@shukriiii

Another great video! thanks for uploading!

Thank you. Once again this video is the most complete explanation for this geographical oddity that I've ever come across, usually only the direction of the monsoon winds is mentioned.

Thank you so much for all your videos. Intriguing topics, amazing insight, no clickbait, straight to the point. Love it. Wish you many subscribers and views. You truly deserve them.

this is quality content. pretty sure you're gonna go big, love the content and style , keep finding interesting stuff to share us!

Casual Earth? More like hardcore earth! Thanks for your awesome videos.

I really love your channel! I discovered you during the long break you had between uploads, and watched all your previous videos. I was so happy when you uploaded again! I really hope that in future, as you get more and more popular, you keep your great habits of putting all sources in the description and keeping your videos relatively short. Sadly, most "educational" youtube content has, over the past five years, turned into half an hour long entertainment garbage. Keep up with the good work!

Fascinating video as per usual, great job.

I’ve been waiting so long for this exact video, thanks!!

@solomon4554

6 ай бұрын

Same!

I live in Nairobi, Kenya, and I was curious about this. Hot af and dry down by the coast, but temperate at the city and rain forest all the way to the west coast of central Africa. Rwanda and Congo are wet and magnificent (can get colder than you think!), and similar elevation to Nairobi, but wetter. But why is Eastern Africa dry at the equator? Now I know!

@vivabratislava

6 ай бұрын

isn't Nairobi located in highlands? that is why is cooler

@JL-ti3us

6 ай бұрын

I cant recall if it was this channel, but you guys should really look for videos on subtropical highland climates and how the correspond with tropical population density. Kenya, Mexico, Columbia prime examples.

@solomon4554

6 ай бұрын

@@JL-ti3us it's called Geodiode, his climate videos are the creme de la creme.

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

@@JL-ti3us Yes, I covered this in my video "the Geography of Mountain Civilizations".

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Nairobi is almost 1800 meters in elevation (5,889 feet). That's a very significant elevation difference compared to the coast.

One of the best scientific, historical and just in general KZread videos I have ever seen. You just gained a subscriber bro, well done and keep going!

Having experienced the fierce Turkana winds, it's fascinating to know that they come all the way from the coast through gaps in the mountains.

Great video. I’ve been looking for a channel like this for years

I loved to learn about this! Thank you for the vid!

I’d like to learn more about the upwelling off the coast. It’s hot bath water off Mombasa and I find it hard to believe there’s cold water out there. But it makes sense there would be because the winds can get cool at night when it blows onshore. Also, that Turkana wind blows from Mombasa, over Nairobi, and out to Lake Kisumu. Fascinating!

@solomon4554

6 ай бұрын

Mombasa has a Savanna climate as opposed to an arid one.

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Mombasa is too far south to experience the upwelling system in Somalia, Yemen, and Oman. You're right, there is very warm water and no upwelling off Mombasa.

@DJ_POOP_IT_OUT_FEAT_LIL_WiiWii

6 ай бұрын

moonbathon bath salts

@Nick_J_

6 ай бұрын

It should be noted also, that the upwelling in this case is still relatively warm water. It is only cooler water compared to the very warm waters around Indonesia and such.

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

@@Nick_J_ This is mostly true, but isolated areas along Somalia and Oman do have water temperatures below 22 C (or about 72 F) in July. Those are the kind of water temperatures many people would wear a wetsuit in.

Hey I love geography and this is the perfect needy channel to get into all the details of the world! Keep up the great work!

Good explanation. Thanks for doing this nice video, perfect script and perfect video.

This is my favorite geography channel on KZread

Great video! Very well explained. This really is prime content that you create here!!!

In old story we were toll the land was raining and green for centuries and suddenly the rain became less and the land got dry .

Clear and well-detailed explanations on a very complex subject.

Thank you for explaining it so well, i had a great time watching it

I googled this a couple weeks ago and everything I could find was incomprehensibly dry research papers, so walked away without a satisfying answer. Thank you so much for clearing this up

This channel is so good!

Top quality content! Thanks :)

always videos on subjects of my previous interests, ones that needed some holes filling 10/10 channel

So well explained! That was amazing

I was hoping you would make a video about this. I had the exact same question while worldbuilding climate zones for a map but could never get a straight forward answer to this, thank you!

Great information intelligently given & a good voice with which to present it!

Quality content! Looking forward to more😊

Always excited for a new video

Excellent video. Material like this was not covered in my own public education. I'm glad this platform exists today so folks like yourself can plug the gap.

Amazing channel, great quality of the video with a fascinating scope

Dahomey Gap is also an area where the shape of the coastline strongly influences the precipitation pattern, leading to a coastal savanna flanked by dense rainforests.

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Yes, the monsoon winds are southwesterly, so they flow onshore in most of West Africa--but they only flow alongshore by Benin, leading to less monsoon rain there. There is an exact parallel to this along part of Oaxaca's coastline, which also faces southeast and thus is drier than adjacent shorelines.

@FrankFantasy

6 ай бұрын

⁠@@casualearth9076Thanks a lot for replying. It’s truly remarkable that both the Dahomey and Oaxaca gaps are clearly visible in the seasonal precipitation pattern you showed at 5:20 as white spots surrounded by shades of blue.

Another fascinating video!

I'd known most of these but this was a wonderful video, thanks for making it! I didn't know about the air pressure jets

Very interesting and informative video! Congrats on 50K plus views in over 1 day!😮

This channel covers a lot of the questions I’ve had

Great video. From Kenya and always wondered why 2/3 of the country to the east and north east are arid and semi arid. Finally got a comprehensive explanation. Thanks.

Am Peter Ngugi from Kenya and am a climatologist researcher. I have found some answers on this video which i have been finding concerning decline of long rains season (March April May) in this particular region (Equatorial Eastern Africa). As the ITCZ move southward from northern hemisphere during Short rains season (October - December), its seems Splitted / gap in between (eastern part and western part), and then join while being above the equator as far as being in southern hemisphere. The splitting phenomena create a vacuum in Somalia, eastern Ethiopia and eastern Kenya hence no tropical storms at this particular regions which ended up to dryness. Good work for a very informative Video..

I'm glad you're back

Des explications claires et bien détaillées sur un sujet trés complexe. (Merci la traduction automatique !!!)

Great video!

I really really like this channel. Please keep the videos coming.

Thanks for the informative video. Subscribed

Wow, what an incredible video, love it

Very interesting! Thanks.

This is an incredible and well explained amount of information. Hope your channel does well. It would be nice to have a slower pace of information so that the density is more easily digested.

Your presentation style is unique (with language spoken intelligible to all) and suits topics in Geography.

Great video as always. Video suggestion: why the interior of Northeastern Brazil is (relatively) very dry even though it's entirely within the tropical zone and at the same latitude as much of the Amazon See: Caatinga en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caatinga

@casualearth9076

6 ай бұрын

Yes, I mentioned the Caatinga briefly in my video in primates but planned to make a dedicated video about its climate.

@solomon4554

4 ай бұрын

The Caatinga is dry due to the way in which the ITCZ is positioned over the region, though local geography is also a factor. The ITCZ is positioned north of the region for most of the year, so the northeast trade winds don't really make landfall in that part of Brazil. At the same time, the southeast trade winds lie in the rain shadow of Brazil's coastal escarpment, meaning relatively little rain falls on the leeward side. By contrast, Salvador on the coast has a very wet tropical rainforest climate on the other side of the escarpment. The Caatinga does have a short wet season in spring when the ITCZ moves over the region, though it's not enough to push it out of the semi-arid zone. I hope this was helpful.

Thanks for explaining it so well

Great video. Thank you.

Please include all of the information you have on it, because it’d be waste to leave out details that you spent time on and that people would also really look forward to - I know I definitely am. you could make a second video that’s also 10 mins … or release a longer video

@solomon4554

6 ай бұрын

I completely agree

Great work , keep it up

I actually had this question for a while. Thank you!

Very interesting. Kudos.

I've always wanted to know why that region was a desert, thanks!

Great job thanks 👍

Fascinating! I've often wondered about this!

Thank you for this clear discussion. And best of all no flashy images all the time. I do think outlining surface area's would help...

Brilliant stuff! 👍

Great video 👏👏 many thanks

Amazing explanation! Could you do one on Australia?

i like your plants, thanks for the video!

That's a lot of info to take in, hopefully we'll get more for different regions in the world

I really like this series thanks a lot.

good video topic

Very informative well done, this explains the occurring droughts in the horn of Africa.

If only The Weather Channel knew the value of this content and how it can drastically change the way people perceive a weather channel. You deserve a slot on TV.

Very good and interesting explanation

Good lecture and visual material🌍🌎🌏

I was literally just scrolling through Google earth a few weeks ago and saw this seemingly out of place desert and got curious so spend the next hour reading about it. This video is a fantastic summary!

This is what i asked for months, and no one can answer this, even the BMKG (Indonesia national organisation of Geography and atmosphere)

Wow love this topic, it's amazing how all its geographic features impact a region's climate. Can you do Argentinian vs Chilean Patagonia? it's an interesting place to explore this topic in such detail.

I feel like you can explain most geographical questions with this 2-part answer: - Why? Because of wind, heat, and moisture patterns caused by the Coriolis force - Why not? Because mountains block the aforementioned affects and providing a rain shadow

Thank you for the wonderfully demonstrated video, I found it very informative. Kudos to you and your work. I have a question regarding the current situation in Somalia and the flood with the El Niño phenomenon, which is came following a drought and a failed five consecutive rainy seasons. Looking at the geography, are these climate patterns going to be the norm in the future. Thank you very much!

Thank you for this video! The Horn of Africa has always struck me as a climatological oddity.

This was/is fascinating! I want to know more

MR DAVIS POSTED LETS GO 🗣️

As a Somali, watching this video explained why Nairobi felt like I was back in Addis Abba and why Muqdisho is brighter and hotter! Thank you Casual Earth!

I've moved to Somalia from the UK. And i wondered why its so arid and dry down here. I'm always looking at the remperature map, and see parts of Ethiopia 10 degrees cooler. I see western Ethiopia as lushes and green and Somaliland dry and desert. Now i know why, its because of the "Rain Shadow" effect. This is so interesting. Thank you for this great video!

looks like I found a new channel to binge. I love the content, I love your rhetoric skills aaand you look cute.

Very nice video, found you on Lemmy. Subscribed

amazing! thanks