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| Wreckage of a road destroyed by flash flooding this summer in Death Valley |
A full 70 percent of the nation's westernmost states are in drought.
In Arizona, 85 percent of the state is listed as being in drought as of last week, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. That's a tiny bit better than the 98 percent of the state being in drought three months ago, but still.
Just this week, we learned there will be more cuts to water usage from the Colorado River due to the long lasting, crushing drought.
Yet, we've been seeing news of flash floods for a good month now, especially in Arizona, the deserts of southern California, parts of Utah and places in and around Las Vegas.
The floods have been impressive in spots. Recently, Furnace Creek in Death Valley recorded 1.46 inches of rain, just 0.01 inches short of the record. The more impressive statistic is that Death Valley on average only gets about two inches of rain per year, so they received 75 percent the normal yearly allotment in just a few hours.
About 1,000 employees and visitors to the park were stranded there until roads could be cleared in a day or so. The park's emergency services building and some residences also flooded.
In Las Vegas, torrential rain overloaded streets and roof drains. Water gushed from the electronic odds board at Cirq. Water poured from the ceiling at Planet Hollywood and Caesar's Palace, but gamblers there kept at the slot machines even as water poured down on them. Sigh. This has happened more than once this summer in Las Vegas.
Last weekend, three inches of rain in normally arid Scottsdale, Arizona, caused a lot of damaging floods. There's also been quite a bit of flooding in Phoenix this summer. Debris flows from burn scars have damaged neighborhoods in and around Flagstaff, Arizona.
It might even get worse. Parts of Arizona and New Mexico have a high likelihood of flash flooding today and tomorrow as a new surge of moisture comes in.
It's monsoon season in the Desert Southwest. The deserts heat up big time in early summer. That hot air rises, creating low pressure. Nature hates a vacuum, so air is pulled in from the Pacific Ocean and Gulf of Mexico to replace that hot air that rose and dissipated.
The Pacific and Gulf of Mexico are obviously wet, so the flowing into the Desert Southwest is humid. This sets off daily thunderstorms, some of which are pretty intense.
The monsoon happens every summer. Some years, the moisture is paltry. Some years, like now, you get a lot of humid days and heavy thunderstorms.
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| A forecast issued today shows drought conditions improving this fall in places like Arizona (green shading) but persisting through huge areas of the West (in brown). |
The rain comes in short, sharp bursts, and the landscape doesn't absorb these downpours easily. Flash flood result.
Of course, the rain does help. NOAA's Seasonal Drought Outlook, just released this morning, predicts drought conditions will ease or even disappear in parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas between now and November.
However, that same outlook indicates drought will persist in virtually all of California, Nevada and most of Utah.
The local hit and miss downpours in the Desert Southwest only do so much to put a dent in the drought.
What's really needed are a series of winters with widespread, frequent storms that dump lots of snow on the mountain peaks. Then that snow would gradually melt in the spring and early summer, replenishing rivers and reservoirs.
There's no guarantee of that, of course.
By the way, the drought out west is not just their problem. It affects you and me. Cutbacks in irrigation cause crop losses, helping to drive up grocery prices at Price Chopper, Shaw's Hannaford and Walmart.
The drought also creates a need for federal resources to supply water to drought stricken areas, extinguish large wildfires and build infrastructure to save and conserve water. That's your tax dollars at work.
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