Thursday, August 1, 2013

Seeing Drought

by Jennifer Wemhoff, Program Manager
 
The U.S. Drought Monitor is produced weekly, and is developed through a combination of multiple indicators and impacts from a variety of federal and academic partners. It is a valuable tool for water managers everywhere, and can be fascinating to the rest of us.
 
The Drought Monitor enables us to "see" drought as it develops, expands, retreats, and moves. This video shows the weekly map from January 2010 through December 2012. It's fascinating to see the persistence of drought in many parts of the U.S. and is a visual representation of how widespread the impacts of drought can be felt.
 

 
 
If you want to see more animations of drought by year, check out http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/animations.html and see the U.S. drought maps all the way back to 1999.
 
Watching drought unfold is a reminder that we all have a responsbility to conserve water and use it responsibly, in everything we do.
 
Is your area dealing with drought? What's the worst drought you have experienced?

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