The Virginia Drought Monitoring Task Force is telling us today that we’re all still in either a drought watch, drought warning or drought emergency.
The recent rainfall has been helpful, according to a release from the task force, but only to prevent drought conditions from worsening.
Precipitation over the past seven days was near or above normal across much of the Commonwealth, and has been above normal over the past 30 days has been above normal for a majority of the state, except for portions of the Chowan, Shenandoah and Roanoke regions.
While the past several months have seen a shift toward above-normal precipitation for portions of Virginia, areas around Danville, Lynchburg and Staunton remain drier than normal.
Groundwater levels continue to be much below normal, with indicator wells in northern and south-central areas of the state at or near historic record-low water levels.
The seven-day forecast calls for near-to-above-normal totals of 2 to 5 inches in areas east of I-95.
Precipitation amounts taper off moving west, as central areas are expected to receive normal-to-above-normal totals of 0.5 to 2 inches.
Far southwest areas are expected to receive between 0.1 and 0.5 inches.
Additional information on the current drought status is available on the DEQ drought webpage and Drought Dashboard.
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Chris Graham
