Is the coast of Peru dry or moist? Why is this?
447836
The coastal areas are temperate and dry.  The Andes prevents moister air from the inland jungles from reaching the coast.  Ocean currents keep weather systems moving northward so away from the coast.
387747
It's off the coast of Venezuela.
229052
At that latitude (dist from equator) Air tends to descend instead of rise (and create rain) like in the tropics.  Look at all land around that dist from the equator.  Mostly dry if it is not coastal.
59588
The Atacama desert is nestled along the coast of Chile, South America - right next to the Pacific Ocean - the biggest body of water in the world. Much of the desert extends up into the Andes mountains and is very high in elevation. Unlike more familiar deserts, like the Sahara desert in Africa and the Mojave in California, the Atacama is actually a pretty cold place, with average daily temperatures ranging between 0°C and 25°C. The annual rainfall (or lack of it) defines a desert, but that doesn't mean that it never rains in Atacama. Every so often a warming effect over the Pacific Ocean around the equator changes the weather the world over and even places like the driest desert in the world can become doused with drenching storms. Even though Atacama gets almost no rainfall, there is water in this arid place and you'll find it in the following places:\n\nSalt Lakes\nDuring years of heavy rainfall in the distant past, enough water accumulated in basins found throughout the Andes to create lakes. Some of the lakes got their water from melting glaciers at the end of the last ice age. But in some lakes in the Andes mountains, such as Atacama, more water is lost through evaporation than is replaced by rainfall so the lakes are drying up. As the water evaporates, the mineral salts in the water become more concentrated, creating very salty water.\n \nSnow\nIn the higher elevations when precipitation comes to Atacama snow falls instead of rain. There are small patches of unmelted snow in the mountain tops where in never gets warm enough to melt the snow.\n\nUnderground \nAnywhere you go in the world, regardless of how much or little it rains, there is always water underground. After it rains, some of the rainwater evaporates back into the air, but much of it trickles down into the ground and stays there - even in the desert. How much water and where depends on a number of things; soil composition, air and soil surface temperature, amount and frequency of rainfall/precipitation, and drainage. Since the Andes is a volcanically active mountain range, the magma beneath the ground will heat the groundwater in certain places causing geysers to erupt.\n\nFog and Dew \nMost of the precipitation that comes to the Atacama is in the form of fog that blows in the from the Pacific. Fog is essentially very low clouds, consisting of water vapor cooling and beginning to condense. If you've ever been in fog you know that it can leave you a little moist. When the air temperature reaches dew point the water vapor in the air condenses to leave little droplets of water behind. The few things that are able to survive in the Atacama live on the combined moisture from fog and dew
1151232
Then where the hell is WET?
260898
i dont think theres many areas on the east coast,,my guess is that west coast waters are warmer
1043134
Deserts cover about one fifth of the Earth’s surface and occur where rainfall is less than 50 cm/year. Although most deserts, such as the Sahara of North Africa and the deserts of the southwestern U.S., Mexico, and Australia, occur at low latitudes, another kind of desert, cold deserts, occur in the basin and range area of Utah and Nevada and in parts of western Asia. Most deserts have a considerable amount of specialized vegetation, as well as specialized vertebrate and invertebrate animals. Soils often have abundant nutrients because they need only water to become very productive and have little or no organic matter. Disturbances are common in the form of occasional fires or cold weather, and sudden, infrequent, but intense rains that cause flooding.\n\nThere are relatively few large mammals in deserts because most are not capable of storing sufficient water and withstanding the heat. Deserts often provide little shelter from the sun for large animals. The dominant animals of warm deserts are nonmammalian vertebrates, such as reptiles. Mammals are usually small, like the kangaroo mice of North American deserts.\n\nDesert biomes can be classified according to several characteristics.\nThere are four major types of deserts:\n\n\nHot and Dry\nSemiarid\nCoastal\nCold \n\nHot and Dry Desert\nThe four major North American deserts of this type are the Chihuahuan, Sonoran, Mojave and Great Basin. Others outside the U.S. include the Southern Asian realm, Neotropical (South and Central America), Ethiopian (Africa) and Australian.\nThe seasons are generally warm throughout the year and very hot in the summer. The winters usually bring little rainfall. Temperatures exhibit daily extremes because the atmosphere contains little humidity to block the Sun’s rays. Desert surfaces receive a little more than twice the solar radiation received by humid regions and lose almost twice as much heat at night. Many mean annual temperatures range from 20-25° C. The extreme maximum ranges from 43.5-49° C. Minimum temperatures sometimes drop to -18° C.\n\nRainfall is usually very low and/or concentrated in short bursts between long rainless periods. Evaporation rates regularly exceed rainfall rates. Sometimes rain starts falling and evaporates before reaching the ground. Rainfall is lowest on the Atacama Desert of Chile, where it averages less than 1.5 cm. Some years are even rainless. Inland Sahara also receives less than 1.5 cm a year. Rainfall in American deserts is higher—almost 28 cm a year.\n\nSoils are course-textured, shallow, rocky or gravely with good drainage and have no subsurface water. They are coarse because there is less chemical weathering. The finer dust and sand particles are blown elsewhere, leaving heavier pieces behind.\n\nCanopy in most deserts is very rare. Plants are mainly ground-hugging shrubs and short woody trees. Leaves are “replete” (fully supported with nutrients) with water-conserving characteristics. They tend to be small, thick and covered with a thick cuticle (outer layer). In the cacti, the leaves are much-reduced (to spines) and photosynthetic activity is restricted to the stems. Some plants open their stomata (microscopic openings in the epidermis of leaves that allow for gas exchange) only at night when evaporation rates are lowest. These plants include: yuccas, ocotillo, turpentine bush, prickly pears, false mesquite, sotol, ephedras, agaves and brittlebush.\n\nThe animals include small nocturnal (active at night) carnivores. The dominant animals are burrowers and kangaroo rats. There are also insects, arachnids, reptiles and birds. The animals stay inactive in protected hideaways during the hot day and come out to forage at dusk, dawn or at night, when the desert is cooler.\n\n\nSemiarid Desert\nThe major deserts of this type include the sagebrush of Utah, Montana and Great Basin. They also include the Nearctic realm (North America, Newfoundland, Greenland, Russia, Europe and northern Asia).\nThe su
117878
The depth of water also has effect. The shallower the water the warmer. The deeper the colder. So water in the tropics, near the equator and shallow should be warmest.\nSee the link below.
1037202
because not as much surface area is exposed to the air. But it will eventually dry.
289726
well, it all depends. If you live in like, california it can be anything from really weird weather like hot one week and a blizzard the next, and if you live in like south america, in peru, the waters get really warm. that's just a few of them.
218545
Yes it cdan be too cold to snow. \n\nThe driest spot on the face of the earth is NOT the Atacama desert, it is the South Pole. From the reference here are figures of mm. of precipitable water vapor in the air measured in 1995:\n\nSouth Pole \nPercentile, Winter  & Summer \n\n25%, .19    .34\n50%, .25    .47\n75%, .32    .67\n\nAtacama\nPercentile, Winter & Summer\n\n25%, .68 1.1\n50%,  1.0 2.0\n75%,  1.6 3.7\n\nThe Atacama is so dry that there are some places in the Atacam where it has never been any measurable rain recorded, in over 100 years of measurements. Yet, the driest season in the Atacama still has considerably more precipitable water vapor in the air than the most humid season at the South Pole.  \n\nSo the answer is, yes it can be so cold that there is no moisture in the air, so it cannot snow.
387629
The southern 2/3 of the coast and inland are a Mediterranean climate (mild year-round, good for growing)\n\nNorthern 1/3 is a Marine West Coast climate (cool and rainy year-round)\n\nMost of the Nevada border is a Variable Highland climate (cooler, will see snow and winds- avg. mountain climate)\n\nSoutheast California (Death Valley region) is a desert climate (meaning implied)
669862
Wow. If the air at ground level is very dry, the rain will evaporate before it can hit the ground. This is called "virga."
1073872
Scientists seem to think so, but I think a lot of those scientists just tend to fall back on the views of other scientists that have already performed studies through the use of questionable proxies, and they simply want some of this highly-biased media attention. Anyway, applying some basic laws of physics to your question, a warmer atmosphere will hold more moisture. So regions that normally receive regular rains will probably receive more rain as the average temperature increases. Very important to remember this. However, deserts are a whole different ball game. We have deserts because of the nature of global winds in our upper atmosphere, like the Westerlies over the USA. Along our equator, huge amounts of hot air rise into the upper areas of our atmosphere and then they drop back down to the Earth around 20 to 30 degrees latitude.These sinking winds are bone dry, therefore, most of our deserts are along these latitudes. If there is an increase in the amount of hot air rising at the equator due to an increase in our average temperature, it would suggest that there would be a increase of bone dry winds falling onto the desert regions. So...the deserts would probably be even drier than they are now. And they may also expand. However, as I mentioned earlier, with more rainfall in the rainy regions, let's consider the possibility of an expansion of our rainy areas, which is supported by some scientific studies. They just don't really have a clue when it comes to something as unpredictable and fluid as our atmosphere.
73777
Moisture brought in off the pacific I suspect.
250491
Not really.  Ocean air is full of moisture and salt.  Moisture is not always good for your lungs.  And salt air leaves a nice sticky coating on everything.
134471
In wet/moist climates