Wednesday, October 6, 2004

Another year of drought ends

New water year starts Oct. 1


By GREG STAHL
Express Staff Writer

Just as Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne announced Idaho?s 24th county drought declaration this week, federal water experts proclaimed the 2003-2004 water year, which ended Thursday, Sept. 30, will officially go down in the books as another year of drought.

Eastern Idaho received about 10 inches of precipitation this year, about 85 percent of a normal year, the National Weather Service said.

While 85 percent does not sound drastic, it is the accumulated deficit from six below-average years that has put parts of the Snake River Plain in the ?exceptional drought? category, the most severe ranking on the U.S. Drought Monitor.

?We?ve got a lot of ground to make up,? said Sherrie Hebert, a National Weather Service hydrologist in Pocatello.

Last week, Kempthorne added Minidoka County to the list of counties receiving emergency drought relief. This year?s 24 drought declaration counties, including Blaine County, compare with 19 last year.

The declarations allow irrigators in the counties to work with the Department of Water Resources to secure temporary water rights and to temporarily modify existing water rights.

Herbert said eastern Idaho received about 20 fewer inches of precipitation than expected over the last six years.

But it?s not all gloom and doom.

This was the first year since 1999 that Pocatello was close to its normal precipitation levels. The city came in at 97 percent of normal for the water year. In 1999, it was 94 percent of normal.

But in between, it was 62 percent, 56 percent, 55 percent and 56 percent in 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2003 respectively.

According to National Weather Service spokesperson Vernon Preston, the severity of a drought depends on the extent of moisture deficiency, the duration of the deficiency and the size of the affected area. Further, there are four divisions of drought, Preston said.

Meteorological drought indicates a departure from normal precipitation. Agricultural drought indicates low soil moisture. Hydrological drought occurs when surface and ground water supplies are low. Socioeconomic drought occurs when a water shortage begins to affect people.

Pocatello is definitely in a meteorological drought, Preston said. Eastern Idaho reservoirs remain extremely low and are in a hydrological drought.

American Falls Reservoir is at 4 percent of capacity, and Palisades Reservoir is at 11 percent.

Finally, Pocatello, as an isolated example, is looking better in a meteorological sense.

But ?when combining precipitation deficits and low reservoirs, there is a lot of ground?or above normal winters?to make up the lost precipitation,? Preston said.

Better-than-average summer rains and lower temperatures helped irrigators and have left reservoirs slightly higher than last year, but that is nothing to brag about, said Lyle Swank who works for the eastern Snake River water district.

It is much better to get a good snowpack, he said, and bank up on water for next year.

But that does not seem to be coming.

An El Nino weather phenomenon appears to be building over the southern Pacific Ocean, and that tends to bring warmer and drier winters to Idaho.

The Associated Press contributed to this article.




 Local Weather 
Search archives:


Copyright © 2024 Express Publishing Inc.   Terms of Use   Privacy Policy
All Rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Express Publishing Inc. is prohibited. 

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.