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foxtrot

It's about to finally rain properly for the first time since November (self.off_grid)

submitted 1 year ago by foxtrot to c/off_grid

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I'm in northern Spain and the last time it rained properly was November 2022 (we had about 120mm in a day, which did a fair bit of damage). Since then, it's been 8mm at most - which is hardly anything.

Tomorrow night we're predicted to get about 50 mm, which would be amazing and fill all our water tanks. We only have rain as a water source and the local rivers are getting more and more dry. If we do get that much rain that'll mean cancelling some plans (can't get to the tarmac road when it's that wet) but boy do we need it :')

Side question - in my area, we measure rainwater in millimiters per centimeter and liters per meter (10 mm = 10 liters per square meter). How do you measure rain in your country?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

The American southwest monsoon season has just begun (I wrote a bit about it here).

can’t get to the tarmac road when it’s that wet

That's how it affects me, primarily. I move from dry camping spot to dry camping spot, and need to be able to get out to reprovision and to meet max day limits.

in my area, we measure rainwater in millimiters per centimeter and liters per meter (10 mm = 10 liters per square meter). How do you measure rain in your country?

In the US we use inches. My understanding is as long as the catching/measuring container is straight-sided the volume or area don't affect the catchment/measurement. Could be a plll bottle or a cistern. If it works the way other conversions do 1" of rain in the US is equivalent to 25.4mm metric.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Colorado, US here, we measure by inches.

We have been in perpetual drought for a number of years, generally not reaching capacity in our reservoirs, but once in awhile we get lucky. This year in particular we have received near-continuous storms for the last two months and most of my State officially left drought conditions earlier this month. It's certainly been a nice change.

A fun thing about places like this... because the rainfall is generally so small and unpredictable, we have historically had laws preventing rainwater collection in the city. Apparently the cities felt that they "owned" this water and citizens had no right to capture and store it. Those laws were finally overturned about a decade ago. One of the driving factors was that people wanted to collect the water to use on lawns and gardens instead of paying the city for their water usage, especially in times of drought when water restrictions were being set. There were a lot of angry people fighting against that!

Water collection has been something I've thought about for a number of years. There are nearby places where I can buy large recycled food-safe containers which I know a lot of people use for this purpose, it's just a matter of actually setting up several containers and attaching them to the house gutters.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 weeks ago

This didn't age well!