Midafternoon Tropical Thunderstorm

Kuala Lumpur gets about 100 inches (2.5 meters) of rain each year (compared to around 15 inches per year in Lubbock). Before I came here, I was a little worried that KL might be like Seattle, where it drizzles all the time and the sun never shines. That is certainly not the case. Although it rains regularly in KL, most often rains occur in the late afternoon or early evening and don't last for too long.

I was working at home this afternoon when a thunderstorm came through (it was either thunder or else the Indonesian Navy had brought in their battleships to try to settle a recent boundary conflict because it was very loud).

The Views From My Apartment Window at 3:15

The rain was pounding down and the lightning and thunder show was in full swing.






The Views From My Apartment Window at 4:30

The worst of the storm lasted for about 15 minutes and then it rained steadily for another half hour. An hour later at 4:30 everything was back to normal.


I saw the Hotel Armada, the white building located in the center of the photo, get struck by lightning during the middle of the storm.



The Water Has To Go Somewhere

When this much rain falls in such a short period of time, the water has to go somewhere. Unlike Lubbock, KL and PJ have a well-developed drainage system. In my area there is an open drainage system that initially drains into the lake in the park across the street. During the storm, the water level in the lake rose almost two feet above the normal level. (I tried to take a photo of this from inside my building during the storm, but I found out that my "auto focus" camera would rather focus on the water droplets on the window than on the lake across the street). The water drains from a lake into a drainage ditch (in Lubbock we would call it a river) that runs behind my apartment. I don't know where the water in this ditch eventually ends up.

Usually, the ditch contains so little water that I could easily jump across is (remember, I am a white guy so that can't be too far). Here is the river during the peak of the storm.