SEOUL – South Korea dealt with the wettest winter in about half a century, seeing a historic amount of rain drenching the nation in recent months, the weather agency said on March 7.

From Dec 1, 2023, to end-February, up to 236.7mm of rain was observed in the nation, marking the highest amount of precipitation to be recorded in the cited period since 1973, when the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) started collecting the related data.

The latest precipitation level recorded was 2.7 times higher than the 30-year average of 89mm of rain. It also beat the previous record high of 195.9mm observed in 1988 by 40.8mm.

According to KMA, South Korea also saw 31.1 days of rain during the same period, compared with the 30-year average of 19.4 days. Rainfall occurred nearly twice as often compared with the average number of rain days during winter in the past five years, which was 16.1 days.

KMA cited a pressure ridge that was formed due to 2023’s frequent influx of wet and warm southerly winds as the reason behind the heavy rainfall experienced this winter.

From Dec 10 to 15, 2023, South Korea saw a lot of rain due to low pressure that developed in southern China coupled with high pressure that developed in the eastern area of the Korean peninsula.

During this time, Gangneung, a city in the state of Gangwon, saw 91.2mm of rain, and Jeonju, the capital of North Jeolla province, saw 63.8mm of rain, breaking the record for the highest amount of rainfall recorded in the month of December.

This winter was also the second-warmest winter on record since KMA started compiling related data.

The average temperature recorded was 2.4 deg C, 1.9 deg C higher than the 30-year average of 0.5 deg C. It was slightly lower than the corresponding temperature in 2019, which came to 2.8 deg C, marking the warmest winter on record. THE KOREA HERALD/ASIA NEWS NETWORK