Looking up several deserts in the US, such as Great Basin, Death Valley, and Mojave, wikipedia says they’re caused by the rain shadow effect. However as you move east into the Rockies, you get rain again. Where does this water come from if it’s been drained out by previous mountain ranges? And why do the Rockies themselves not cause nearly as severe of a rain shadow? The regions east of the Rockies from Canada to the US are not desert anymore.
I like climate science and can’t wrap my head around this one yet.
tl;dr why is the western US so dry but rainy again at and past the Rockies?
In: Earth Science
There’s a big puddle of water nearby called the Gulf of Mexico. If you [go here](https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-93.18,35.60,1353), you can see a wind map and see air flowing north from the gulf towards Colorado and points north. There’s currently a high pressure system sitting there now that’s holding it back, but a low pressure system would have winds in the opposite direction and pull that air north..
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