We’ve seen a decent amount of rainfall across the state over the past couple of weeks with several weather systems. This has helped keep the drought from getting worse, but long-term drought conditions continue to maintain.
Current Conditions
The US Drought Monitor continues to show 100% of the state in at least D0, or abnormally dry, conditions. 97% of the state remains in at least D1, moderate drought, conditions with 81% still in at least D2, severe drought. The D3, or extreme drought, area continues to slowly expand with a noticeable jump in the Northeast corner of the state this week to include parts of White, Lumpkin and Union Counties. This brings the total extreme drought area to 38%.
Recent rainfall
Compared to one week ago, that change in the northeast is the only difference thanks to some good rainfall totals across much of the state. Looking back at the past 3 weeks a large portion of the I-20 corridor and nearby areas have seen 5-7″ of rainfall, including much of Metro Atlanta. The entire northern 4/5 of the state have seen at least 2-3″ in the last 3 weeks with just the far south/southeast having some areas below 1″.
This rain has really helped ease the 3 month rainfall deficits across the state, dramatically reducing them to just 1-2″ across much of Northwest and West-Central Georgia. Elsewhere in the state the 3 month deficits continue to be much greater- as much as 7-8″ across south Georgia and 4-6″ elsewhere.
Future rainfall
We are heading quickly into the beginning of the growing season, which will have a noticeable impact on soil moisture and general drought conditions. As trees and other plants begin to leaf out and grow, they will remove quite a bit of moisture from the soil. This will worsen the sensible effects of the drought as people begin to plant their gardens for the summer.
Unfortunately for us, after the upcoming cold front it does appear we will be re-entering a fairly dry period. Over the next 10 days both the GFS and Euro models show at most 1-1.5″ of rainfall across North Georgia, with less further south. Most, if not all, of this precipitation comes from the arctic front on Sunday into Monday.
So, while we have been able to maintain our long-term drought without any worsening, there is a good chance we will continue to see it expand as we head through the next 7-10 days.
