Barometric Pressure Forecast for Accra, Ghana
Barometric pressure forecast for Accra, Ghana — on the Gulf of Guinea coast at five degrees north, where the daily tide outweighs the weather. See current barometric pressure and what it means for weather-sensitive people.
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Pressure and weather in Accra
Accra lies on the Atlantic coast of Ghana at a little over five degrees north, well inside the tropics, and the barometer behaves quite differently here than it does in the mid-latitudes. There are no extratropical cyclones and no cold fronts, so the large day-to-day swings that drive pressure sensitivity in Europe or North America simply do not occur. What dominates instead is the atmospheric tide, a twice-daily oscillation of roughly three hectopascals that peaks near ten in the morning and ten at night and is far more regular and more visible near the equator than anywhere else. Layered on top of that is the seasonal march of the intertropical convergence zone, which sweeps north across the country in spring and back south in autumn, giving Accra a major rainy season from April to June and a shorter one in September and October. The city is unusually dry for the West African coast because of the Dahomey Gap, a break in the rainforest belt where the coastline runs parallel to the prevailing monsoon flow. From December into February the Harmattan blows dust south from the Sahara, dropping humidity sharply and hazing the sky for days at a time.
What this means for you
If you track current barometric pressure in Accra you will see a clean, repeating daily wave rather than the storm-driven falls that dominate temperate charts. That makes a barometric pressure forecast here most useful for spotting the rarer genuine departures — squall lines arriving ahead of the rains, and the dry, dusty Harmattan spells that many weather-sensitive people find just as provoking.