Photos: Unusual rainfall brings winter flowers to Chile's Atacama desert

Copiaps: Large swaths of the Atacama desert, the driest on the planet, have been covered with purple and white flowers after unusual rainfall patterns in northern Chile.

Normally, such a desert bloom occurs every few years in the southern springtime - if and when conditions are just right - blanketing thousands of square kilometres.

But the flowers are making an appearance now in winter, something that hasn't happened since 2015, experts say.

Cesar Pizarro, head of biodiversity conservation at the National Forestry Corporation, said that 11-12 millimetres of rainfall in April, "plus low cloud cover that has been very intense in the area and that wets these surfaces every night," helped activate these plants.

While the famed spring flowering desert covers over 15,000 square kilometres, this winter efflorescence covers only a few hundred square kilometres.

When the bloom peaks, more than 200 plant species blossom.

Recent weather conditions have mainly suited the 'pata de guanaco,' a purple flower that barely requires water and prefers sandy sites.

Scientists have not yet determined whether this phenomenon, also recorded in the winter of 2015, "is directly related to climate change or not, or to the El Nino or La Nina phenomena," said Pizarro.

View of the Atacama Desert covered by flowers in Copiapo, Chile.

View of the Atacama Desert covered by flowers in Copiapo, Chile, taken on July 10, 2024.