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First Major Rain in Centuries Triggers Wave of Death in Earth's Driest Desert

After not experiencing any meaningful amounts of precipitation for at least 500 years, Chile’s Atacama Desert is finally getting some rain. Quite unexpectedly, however, these rains—instead of fostering life—are doing the exact opposite.

[...] The unprecedented rains, the authors say, are the result of changing climatic conditions over the Pacific Ocean. An extensive “mass of clouds” came to the desert from the Pacific Ocean—an “unprecedented phenomenon,” the researchers say, that occurred twice in three years.

The resulting precipitation resulted in the widespread extinction of many native microbial species. The local extinction rate, according to the new study, reached as high as 85 percent in the hardest-hit places. Extremophile organisms, accustomed to arid conditions, were unable to cope with the influx of water.

“The hyperdry soils before the rains were inhabited by up to 16 different, ancient microbe species,” said Alberto G. Fairén, an astrobiologist at Cornell and a co-author of the new study, in a statement. “After it rained, there were only two to four microbe species found in the lagoons,” said Fairen, who is also a researcher with the Centro de Astrobiología, Madrid. “The extinction event was massive.”

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