Poniente
| Winds in the Mediterranean |
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Poniente (from Spanish poner , 'set', 'put' or 'lay', where the sun “sits down”, i.e. sets) is the name given to the west wind on the southern Spanish and northern Moroccan coasts. It is the opposite of the Levante , the east wind , or the Terral , the north wind with the influence of foehn .
The Poniente is generally a light wind on the southern Spanish and northern Moroccan Atlantic coasts, but it is colder than the Levant because it comes from the ocean. On the east coast of Spain, however, the Poniente is perceived as warmer than on the west coast, as it heats up when crossing the Iberian Peninsula . The Poniente blows into the Mediterranean between the Sierra Nevada and the Atlas Mountains . On the Mediterranean coast, the Poniente occurs as a warm and in summer hot wind, as it touches land coming from the Atlantic and is heated up by the continental climate until it hits the Mediterranean coast again.
The Poniente influence is very different. There are years in which the Poniente blows for the most part and this is only temporarily replaced by the Levante between June and August, and others when the Levante or the Mediterranean, especially around Málaga, has a lot of Terral wind in summer.
See also
literature
- Jean Vialar: Les vents régionaux et locaux . 1948 (new edition Météo-France, 2003).