Wettest Oct. puts Ark. close to wettest year ever

Associated Press - November 1, 2009 6:14 PM ET

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) - Central Arkansas is on track for a new yearly record for rainfall. Two months of the year are still left but precipitation totals for 2009 are already up to a mark less than 8 inches shy of the current record of 75.54 inches, set in 1882.

National Weather Service records show that rainfall since Jan. 1 at the Little Rock Airport totals 68.26 inches this year.

Merely average rainfall in November and December would put 2009 well over the 1882 record. The average rainfall for November at Little Rock is 5.73 inches, while the December average is 4.71 inches, for a two-month total average of 10.44 inches. That's according to Tabitha Clarke, a forecaster at the National Weather Service office in North Little Rock.

The Weather Service said October 2009 was officially the wettest October on record at the Little Rock Airport. The 16.56 inches that fell in October beat by more than an inch the old record of 15.35 inches, set in October 1984.