Drought status washed away.
It may seem a bit anti-climatic after a very rainy week but the northwest section of Monroe County is officially out of any drought category, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor report issued on Thursday.
The center of the county saw its drought status improve to the least serious category, “abnormally dry,” while only the very southeastern tip of the county was considered in “moderate” drought.
Thursday’s report included rainfall through Tuesday, April 25, however, it did not include rain from Thursday morning, April 27.
Much of the area started falling into drought categories one year ago after a dry early spring with much of East Tennessee reaching the worst category, “exceptional drought” by summer and fall.
The dry weather help lead to a disastrous fall fire season and made it tough on hay and other crops.
East Tennessee is normally a very wet region with vegetation dependent upon a lot of water.
It does not take a long period of dry days to get back into drought status, but for now, the year-long battle to get out of drought status might be a cause for celebration.
Farmers might now actually be hoping for a few dry days to work in their fields.

Today’s manual snow survey by the Department of Water Resources (DWR) at Phillips Station in the Sierra Nevada found a Snow Water Equivalent (SWE) of 27.8 inches, 190 percent of the May 1 long-term average there (14.6 inches).
Electronic measurements indicate the water content of the statewide snowpack today is 42.5 inches, 196 percent of the May 1 average.
The SWE of the northern Sierra snowpack is 39.9 inches (199 percent of average); the central and southern Sierra readings are 47.1 inches (202 percent of average) and 37.6 inches (180 percent of average), respectively.
Today’s readings will help hydrologists forecast spring and summer snowmelt runoff into rivers and reservoirs.
“California’s cities and farms can expect good water supplies this summer,” said DWR Acting Director Bill Croyle.
“But this ample snowpack should not wash away memories of the intense drought of 2012-2016.
California’s precipitation is the most variable in the nation, and we cannot afford to stop conserving water.” Snowpack water content is measured manually on or near the first of the month from January to May.
Frank Gehrke, chief of the California Cooperative Snow Surveys Program, conducted DWR’s survey today at Phillips and said of his findings, 2017 has been “an extremely good year in terms of the snowpack.” Gehrke said the snowpack is encouraging in terms of surface water supplies.
Lake Oroville in Butte County, the State Water Project’s (SWP) principal reservoir, is 91 percent of average for the date (74 percent of its 3.5-million acre-foot capacity).
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Ethiopia is facing a killer drought.
But it’s going almost unnoticed.. ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — The announcement by the United Nations in March that 20 million people in four countries were teetering on the edge of famine stunned the world and rammed home the breadth of the humanitarian crisis faced by so many in 2017.
On Thursday, the Ethiopian government increased its count of the number of people requiring emergency food aid from 5.6 million to 7.7 million, a move that aid agencies say was long overdue.
The figure is expected to rise further as southeast Ethiopia confronts another fierce drought.
Ethiopia, long associated with a devastating famine in the 1980s, returned to the headlines last year when it was hit by severe drought in the highland region, affecting 10.2 million people.
Food aid poured in, the government spent hundreds of millions of its own money, and famine was averted.
“We’ve spent all the money we’ve got, basically.” With donors focused on Somalia across the border, little international aid has found its way to the Ethiopian areas hit by that drought.
The contrast is clear in the bustling capital, Addis Ababa, where rainy skies and a hive of construction projects make it feel thousands of miles away from any drought.
The United Nations World Food Program (WFP), which is working in Ethiopia’s drought-hit Somali region, has started cutting its food rations to 80 percent.
“It’s stretching the humanitarian community,” WFP regional spokeswoman Challiss McDonough said, referring to the string of crises in the Horn of Africa and elsewhere on the continent.

Another 59 percent of this state is considered to be in "abnormally dry" condition.
Many cities and counties in the state of Connecticut are facing severe drought conditions as reservoirs and wells are drained of their natural resource, water.
April saw 3.77 inches of rain and snow at Bradley, or just .05 inches above normal for that month.
Buttrick said the region’s two-year-long drought will take "many, many months" of normal rainfall to correct.
Precipitation in 2016 was more than 13 inches below normal, and Buttrick said groundwater and aquifer levels in much of Connecticut were significantly depleted.
In their most recent report, the U.S. Drought Monitor experts also noted that "groundwater levels remained unfavorably low" in portions of New England like Connecticut that are still listed as abnormally dry or in moderate drought.
The federal climate scientists said that "additional soaking rainfall will be needed to recharge the region’s aquifers as water demands increase in response to seasonally warmer weather."
Nearly all of Connecticut’s drinking water reservoirs are now listed as being at above 85 percent of normal capacity and some are reporting 100 percent of normal levels.
The lowest reservoir listed on the state Department of Public Health’s March status report was the New Britain Water Department, with 70 percent of normal capacity.
The good news is that the NWS forecast is calling for additional showers in the region late Monday and "more soaking rains" for later in the week, Buttrick added.

WCM approved, new drought operations started.
Within days of signing a Decision of Record for an updated water control manual, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers initiated new drought control measures on the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river system.
At 1,062.46 feet, the ACF’s largest reservoir was still about eight and a half feet below summer full pool of 1,071 feet.
Hopes for a rainy spring to replenish the lake in time for summer recreation went unfulfilled in March and most of April.
When the lake level drops to 1,064 feet, no water is left in the swim areas.
The recently updated ACF water control manual, approved March 30, includes a revised Drought Contingency Plan that initiates drought operations when the federal reservoir projects’ composite conservation storage reaches Zone 3 instead of the lower Zone 4.
“It is unusual to initiate drought operations when two of the three reservoirs are full, but doing so provides the opportunity to conserve water as conditions are expected to get worse,” she said.
The WCM requires that drought plan provisions remain in place until the composite conservation storage reaches Zone 1.
“These manuals provide the framework on how the federal projects in the ACF River Basin will be operated.” The manual, which grants Georgia all the water it requested from the ACF, has provoked the ire of Florida officials, who claim it deprives their state of water needed to sustain the ecology and economy of Apalachicola Bay.
The Corps also contends that the new drought operations plan will improve the resilience of the system during drought.

May 5: 2017 Inland Empire Your Voice Land, Air and Water: Navigating Complex Environmental Issues in the Inland Empire 9am to 4pm, Riverside Join the Environmental Law Section of the California State Bar for a community conference focusing on environmental issues in the Inland Empire. 5.5 Hours Participatory MCLE Credit available for attendance. May 17-19: Workshop on improving the skill of long-range weather forecasts (sub-seasonal to seasonal (S2S) precipitation forecasting) San Diego The Western States Water Council and the California Department of Water Resources are cosponsoring a recurring workshop on improving the skill of long-range weather forecasts (sub-seasonal to seasonal (S2S) precipitation forecasting), to support water management decision-making. The agenda will include lessons learned from recent years’ seasonal outlooks, updates on scientific research on sources of skill and predictability, and programmatic efforts to improve forecasting. Increasing forecast skill will require a sustained investment over time, prioritizing the federal resources necessary to make progress, and a specific focus on the West. Click here for more information. May 18: Groundwater Law Conference San Francisco The American…

Ask the Weather Guys: Is the California drought over?.
A: Drought in the United States has been assessed by a number of different measures over the last several decades.
The Palmer Index is based on a supply-and-demand model of soil moisture.
Of the two, supply is easier to calculate, as it is tied so obviously to precipitation.
The Palmer Index approximates this complicated nest of processes based on a formula that is based on recent temperature and precipitation.
In 1999, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture developed the weekly U.S. Drought Monitor.
By this measure, drought in the U.S. fell to a record low this past week with only 6.1 percent of the contiguous 48 states experiencing drought conditions.
Most notable currently is the official end of the years-long drought in California that was announced last week.
The past winter was quite wet and has filled reservoirs in much of California to capacity.
In fact, there are now fears in certain parts of California that the spring snowmelt will induce flooding.

Arizona water director: I won’t support CAP board’s drought plan.
Mark Henle/The Republic My Turn: The Central Arizona Water Conservation District wants to gamble with water levels in Lake Mead, and that’s just not smart.
Droughts of 30 or even 50 years are not unknown phenomena.
Two board members of the Central Arizona Water Conservation District (CAWCD) recently called for the state’s water managers to rally around a new proposal created by CAWCD staff to (theoretically) protect Arizona’s water in Lake Mead.
This risky gambit lacks a fundamental aspect of credibility and statesmanship that Arizona needs to maintain with our neighbors in Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and California.
A prudent plan – a DCP-Plus plan — would conserve and store enough water in Lake Mead so that a buffer, well above the shortage trigger elevation, is reached.
The Arizona Department of Water Resources is committed to a collaborative approach to water management among all Arizona water users who hold entitlements to Colorado River water.
The Arizona water users who rely on the river have supported my efforts to represent them as DCP negotiations ensued.
It’s simple: I won’t support their plan As director, I am charged with signing the DCP on behalf of the state.
That “Plus plan” is the lynchpin for support by Arizona’s water users when I appear before the state Legislature.

Lee County is currently in the advisory drought declaration level, with the Water Works Board of the City of Auburn (AWWB) having enacted a Phase I Drought Watch for its customers on April 21.
Director of Public Affairs David Dorton said that Phase I consists of voluntary water restrictions for Auburn community members.
“The voluntary water restrictions themselves involve not watering your lawn except between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m. and only watering your lawn on certain days,” Dorton said.
Auburn community members who receive water from the AWWB and have even numbered home addresses should only water their lawns on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.
Those with odd numbered home addresses should only water their lawns on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
There should be no lawn watering on Sundays.
Other ways that community members can help limit their water usage are making sure sprinklers are only spraying water on your lawn, trees or bushes and not on sidewalks, streets or driveways, making sure there are no leaks in water related utilities, taking shorter showers, not letting the water from a sink or a hose run unattended and only washing full loads of laundry or dishes.
“In a lot of ways it’s only common sense ways to save water,” Dorton said.
According to Dorton, it’s too soon to say whether or not the drought will worsen this summer.
“Long term weather predictions are hard to make, but they’re keeping an eye on it,” Dorton said.

Drought’s over, rules aren’t: How local water providers are responding.
So tossing out twice-a-week watering means also getting rid of the 48-hour rule, which isn’t an option.
Cal Water City customers aren’t alone.
San Joaquin County Pockets of Stockton served by the county are still stuck at two days as well, though Public Works Deputy Director Jim Stone said that may change in a couple of months.
Lawns seem to be doing well on two days a week, Stone said last week.
He added that the county will likely be “judicious with our enforcement in the meantime.” The county may propose allowing watering three days a week and making that the permanent rule moving forward.
Lodi also made minor changes just last week, allowing restaurants to resume serving water without asking first, and hotels to go back to automatically washing the linen every day.
Tracy This city is one of the few in the region that no longer has any watering-day restriction.
During the drought, officials cut watering from four days a week to three days.
No watering-day restrictions are in place, though customers are encouraged to conserve.