Active winter pattern leads to significant drought improvement across California

A very active winter season that featured relentless storms brought significant drought improvement to California.
According to a March 14 Drought Monitor report, only 8.24 percent of California is currently labeled in a drought.
Back at the start of winter, 70.11 percent of California was labeled in a drought.
It is quite impressive that a drought that started about five years ago was greatly reduced in only a few months.
Drought conditions two years ago in March 2015.
While the excessive rain and snow did have some negative impacts at times, the overall impact was positive as the rain lead to significant improvement in the drought.
As you can see in the image below, one positive impact was water level improvement in many of the major reservoirs across the state.
Looking back two years from today, it was a much different story with all of the major reservoirs below their historical average.
It also hasn’t been just rainfall that has been plentiful.
The snow total for the season currently stands at 519.5 inches.

Learn More