Relief from the Drought: California Water Levels Rise
Drought levels in California, and especially in Inyo and Mono Counties, have been in the “exceptional drought” stage for months. We’ve gotten used to skiing and snowboarding with patches of dirt around the run, swimming in an ankle-deep canal in summer, and seeing not even the smallest patch of snow in the mountains.
However (fingers crossed), as we start 2022, things are looking up drought-wise.
In less than a month, during the month of December, large portions of California (including Inyo and Mono Counties) went up at least one level on the drought scale. Now, only a very small portion of our state still remains in the “exceptional drought” category.
While we still fall under the “extreme drought” category, NOAA’s three-month precipitation outlook for Jan-Feb-Mar 2022 currently shows Mono and some of Inyo County at normal levels, while some of Inyo County is predicted at 33-40% below normal. It isn’t pulling us out of the drought completely, but after 2020 and 2021, California’s driest years in a century, it’s certainly a good thing.
Recent snowpack has even broken records in some areas. Yosemite National Park recorded 154 new inches of snow through December 29th, making it Yosemite’s snowiest winter in over 40 years and breaking the previous record of 143 inches in 1996. Donner Pass also recorded its snowiest December on record at 214 inches, which is more than 17 feet.
Overall, we are off to a great start for a water year. The National Weather Service has stated that just this far into 2022, many locations in California have already exceeded last year’s total precipitation levels, at roughly 160% of average for this time of year. Even in Southern California, Los Angeles broke their 85-year-old daily rainfall record with 2.34 inches of rain on December 30th.
This level of rainfall and snowpack would need to continue consistently for the West’s drought to even begin to be over, and we’re not sure that will be the case. However, this surplus of water wasn’t fully expected by weather predictions, so there is still hope for our water levels in the months to come.
