Drought Conditions

Many years ago I did a quickie blog post showing NOAA's Drought Monitor. The maps have not changed much (except being a bit easier to read) but the conditions lately have been bad enough to warrant a look at the latest map. 

The dark brown shows areas of "exceptional" drought, a step above "extreme" drought. S and L are for short and long term effects, many areas show both letters.

This NOAA map shows how much rainfall is needed to make up for the drought. In many areas it is well over a foot.

While parts of the Dallas area got over a foot of rain in the last few days, that kind of heavy rainfall tends to drain quickly and not help the situation very much. Comparing last week's map there is only a small decrease in the size of the exceptional drought area.