Drought Takes Toll in West

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Drought Takes Toll in West
10 AM MST, January 16, 2004

Drought conditions are causing
increasing concern in parts of the
southwest as storm after storm
bypasses the area.

A strong Pacific jet stream has been
seen since late fall. However, with a
persistent ridge of high pressure over
the west, the main storm track has
been across northern California,
Oregon and Washington and then into
the northern Great Basin and Rockies,
where significant mountain snows have
fallen recently.

Unfortunately, the southern branch of
the jet stream, which typically brings
storms and rainfall to the southwest and
southern California, has been much
weaker than usual so far this winter.
Rainfall amounts since the beginning of
December include:

Los Angeles, CA: 1.61" (52% of
normal)
San Diego, CA: .72" (31% of normal)
Flagstaff, AZ: 1.11" (40% of normal)
Albuquerque, NM: 0.14" (18.1% of
normal)
Denver, CO: .22" (23 % of normal)

As the graphic in the upper right corner
shows, severe to extreme drought
conditions persist not only in the desert
southwest but also in parts of the Great
Basin, Rockies and High Plains.

While much of Utah, Nevada,
Wyoming, Idaho and Montana has seen
near to to above normal precipitation
through the winter, it will take several
more seasons of plentiful precipitation
to put an end to drought conditions.
As for the desert southwest, A storm
that developed on Wednesday and
Thursday brought some locally heavy
rains to New Mexico and southeast
Arizona appears to be heralding a shift
in the weather pattern that will allow
storms to take a more southerly route.
Long range forecast models show
another storm dropping into the
southwest early next week and possibly
stalling over the area for a few days.