El Niño Transforms World's Driest Non-Polar Desert Into A Lush Wildflower Wonderland

Sarah Benton Feitlinger
Mon, 16 Nov 2015 12:59:19 -0800

Deserts are by definition barren areas of land with little precipitation. But few compare to Atacama Desert. Often called the world's driest non-polar desert, the 600-mile stretch of land gets an average of just 0.13 inches of rain annually, despite its location next to our planet's largest body of water, the Pacific Ocean.