This reminds me of a letter I recieved from my daughter in, I think, 2003. She was working as a short-term missionary in Lima, Peru. Lima sits in the world's second driest desert. All the water comes from rivers running from the Andes; never a trace of rain except in winter when some precip comes from a sea fog. On this one occasion, a thunderstorm formed and dropped an inch of rain. There were several drownings because the city had absolutely no way to handle storm run-off. Rain there is as rare as sand-storms in Antarctica.