The Texas Drought Is Easing, but Slowly
Things are better than last year but still dry across the state. Image courtesy the U.S. Drought MonitorFor the first time in more than a year, less than 1 percent of Texas is in the worst stage of drought. An update today from the U.S. Drought Monitor shows we are steadily recovering from the worst yearlong dry spell in Texas history.
Most of Central Texas is in the least severe stage of drought, “abnormally dry.” Western Travis County and much of the Hill Country is a little bit drier, in “moderate” drought.
But some climatologists say we’re not out of the weeds yet.
Luigi Romolo with the Southern Regional Climate Center says the three-month outlook doesn’t provide much guidance.
“There’s just an equal chance of precipitation being above normal as there is being below normal,” Romolo said. “So unfortunately we don’t really have an answer of what’s going to come in the future. You could pretty much flip a coin and be just as right.”
Meanwhile, the Highland Lakes are still lower than usual. The Lower Colorado River Authority says the combined storage of Lake Buchanan and Lake Travis is still at less than half capacity. Romolo says reservoir levels are the last thing to recover after a drought because the ground has to be saturated enough to provide runoff.
By the way, the National Weather Service says there’s a risk of severe thunderstorms until midnight tonight.
