PHOENIX -- The Phoenix metropolitan area had its 14th wettest year on record in 2008 with the most rainfall since 1998.

The National Weather Service said the Phoenix area had an official precipitation total of 9.58 inches last year -- 25 percent more than the average of 7.66 inches.

Most of the rain could be credited to a soaking monsoon season.

From mid-June through the end of September, the Phoenix area's official gauge took in 5.7 inches. That made last summer the wettest since 1984 and the 10th-wettest overall.

Arizona has been in a drought since the mid-1990s with nine of the last 13 years seeing below-average rainfall.

The total for 2008 wasn't much lower than the combined amount for the previous two years (10.5 inches).

But last year started off wet, with a January that had almost twice as much rain as usual. That gave 2008 a cushion to work with in a late winter/early spring period that was very dry.

Then in late May, a shockingly strong and unseasonable storm hit Arizona. By mid-July, the monsoon was in full swing. In an average monsoon, the rainfall total is 2.77 inches. That mark was passed in early August.

In other weather facts, the average temperature last year in the Phoenix metro area was 75.4 degrees, which was 1.2 degrees above normal and tied with 1992 for the 11th-warmest in more than 110 years of record-keeping.

But this was a cool-down from 2007, when the yearly mean was 76.4 degrees -- the Phoenix area's second-hottest year.

Overnight low temperatures averaged out to 63.8 degrees, ninth-warmest overall, while 2008's average daytime high was 86.9 degrees, the 17th-warmest on record.

Weather experts say the temperatures in the Phoenix metro area are rising due to the effect known as the urban heat island.

During the day, heat is trapped in the region's asphalt, concrete and stucco. At night, these materials are slower to cool than desert land.