'THE GEOLOGY AND MINERAL RESOURCES OF DHUFAR PROVINCE, MUSCAT AND OMAN' [‎19v] (28/96)

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humid. Mists hang over the Jurbaid until late in the afternoon, or by tl
all day and night, while it is raining on the hills which are wrapped trade
in clouds. The temperature in the plains (Jurbaid) rises as high as from
117 degrees Fahrenheit at the end of May and falls to 90 degrees at any
the end of June with a high humidity. The rainfall on the Jurbaid offer;
is probably not more than an average of 5 inches for the four months— Risu
June to September. There is no rainfall in these coastal plains stear
between October to June, and the temperature may be as low as mak<
70 degrees in January in dry air conditions. It is very much better so u:
in the hills, but there may be some winter rain on the Jabal Qara shelt
in the cold weather months of December and January. Dhufar is also
the only section of southern Arabia to experience a typical south-west emei
monsoon of the kind normal to India, particularly the Western was
Ghats and the Deccan plateau.
27. The reason becomes evident from a study of the coasts of able
the Arabian Sea and western Indian Ocean, namely, that Somaliland so fa
shelters the Gulf of Aden on the south and so removes the possible close
conditions for a wet south-west monsoon for the area of the been
Hadhramaut even though it has elevations up to 6,000 feet. East- it m
ward in the Sultanate of Oman there are two areas of highlands— no i
the mountains of Dhufar including Jabal Qamar, Jabal Qara and of tl
Jabal Samhan with elevations up to 3,500 to 4,000 feet, and the date
mountains of Oman behind Muscat—including the Eastern and expc
Western Hajar with Jabal Akhdhar rising to nearly 10,000 feet (in sea i
the peak of Jabal Sham, 9,900 feet). Between the mountains of favo
Oman and those of Dhufar there is a wide belt of low desert (the to t
south-eastward extension of the Ar Rimmal {the Sands), which 300
includes the Rab’al Khali {empty region), of south-east Arabia. the
The coastal strip from the hills of Ja’Alan (40 miles south-west of gulf
Ras A1 Had) for nearly 375 miles (including the island of Masira 250
and the gulf of Masira and Sauqira and Kuria Muria bays) has no plan
highland behind it higher than 750 feet on the average, if that much. Jiw;
Thus a strong moisture-laden wind from the Arabian Sea off the land
Somali coast will encounter high lands only in the mountains of perl
Oman on the one hand and on those of Dhufar on the other, and on 1
will yield moisture, as rain, in these two areas and not on the country air ;
between them.
28. In addition to the south-west monsoon, the mountains of
Oman also have rain from a north-east monsoon similar to the eastern
highlands of Madras. Part of this north-east monsoon may yield
the winter rains of the Jabal Qara and adjacent highlands of Dhufar.
It was due to the strong south-west monsoon that the coastwise
traffic between India and Arabia was affected in earlier days, and this
probably made waiting at some coastal port of southern Arabia
necessary for sailing vessels. That such was the case in ancient
times is now well known and was made evident in the case of Dhufar
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