Arizona Weather Force is issuing an Extended Long Range Forecast for the coming series of storm systems that numbers here at the office have been spitting out.
As stated last month, April will be an interesting month, bringing back the storm pattern we saw several months ago, during the beginning of the 2025-2026 storm season. This will sure to tack on numbers to bring the rainfall amounts for the season up. We are not done until end May.
So, what exactly does this mean. As many of you know already, we will have a system hit during the weekend of April 11st. What you do not know is that this will be a Raiden Storm Pattern thereafter. I can easily go weeks ahead of time when I focus on the numbers. This is no exception. Arizona Weather Force numbers clearly shows high to extreme risk systems hitting Arizona after the weekend storms. We could easily see one 5 days later, a week after that, and believe it or not a week after the third one, which would be the end of the month. Multiple storm systems are in the AZWF Long Range forecast.
Locations: The map is quite clear in showing the higher terrain will see the high risk zones, but you can also see the terrain influence from the high terrain called orographic lifting, south of the mountains for moderate to high risk in the metros of Maricopa, Pinal, Pima, Cochise, Greenlee, and Graham County as well.
A Raiden Storm Pattern means that no other source (Including AZWF Partners) is predicting what pattern in the super long range numbers are showing here at Arizona Weather Force, aptly named by who discovered it, and that ‘other sources’ will overtime only parrot what you just read here ahead of time. If you rely on a long range forecast for rainfall due to agriculture or other means, you are remaining in the right place. The coming series of storms will be called the Raiden Storm Pattern of April 2026, which looks significant.
In closing, the jet stream is definitely starting to show a dip southward for the rest of the month, and this weekend’s system is not the only one that will hit the Southwestern United States, and confidence is high in a series of them through the rest of this month, with below normal temperatures.
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Raiden Storm
Master General Meteorologist ( D21 )