Record Rainfall: Cherrapunji, India
A Land of Contrasts
It's ironic that the wettest place in the world manages to thirst for water each winter when no rain falls at all for months at a time. The type of weather phenomenon that brings so much rain to this part of the world is called the monsoons. Monsoons are seasonal winds that blow from one direction for approximately six months, bringing torrential rains, and then blow from the opposite direction for the remaining six months, during which little rain falls. During the wet season moist air is cooled as it blows over rising land, letting abundant rain fall on the windward side of mountain ranges. But because of widespread destruction of conifer forests that protected the soil, the ground does not absorb the rain that falls so heavily during the monsoon season. The city of Cherrapunji is 1,290 meters above sea level and much of the torrential rains run off the mountains into the valley below, which receives an annual rainfall of 1,270 centimeters. Once it rained 2,290 centimeters in one season! The irrigation system for the town of Cherrapunji is insufficient to provide adequate amounts of clean, potable water from below during the dry season. People who live there frequently have to travel on foot for several kilometers to bathe and get drinking water.
http://www.extremescience.com/wettest.htm
