Lyrical inspiration of the day:
Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And everything you do,Yeah, they were all yellow.After holding off a week on diving back into drought categories, the state of Oklahoma is all yellow once again (or worse) in this week's U.S. Drought Monitor report, released this morning.
For the benefit of those just tuning in, here's what the U.S. Drought Monitor is:
- Created in 1999 as a cooperation of local, state and federal authorities
- Assesses the drought situation nationwide using a five-step scale, from D0 for abnormally dry through D4 for exceptional drought
- Monitors drought factors including lake and pond levels, rainfall, crop reports, wildfires and fire danger, temperatures, soil moisture
- Used to institute burn bans and agricultural relief programsHere's this week's map, compared to last, in both side-by-side (last week left, this week right) and GIF format:
What each color means:
D0 (yellow): Abnormally dry, the lowest drought classification.
D1 (beige) to D2 (bright orange): Moderate to severe. Some damage to crops and pastures, voluntary water rationing.
D3 (bright red): Extreme. Once in 20 to 30 years event. Major crop and pasture loss, water shortages.
D4 (dark red): Exceptional. Once in 50 years event. Significant water shortages and pasture losses. "As dry as it can get."
Sadly, I don't need to mention the color white this week, because for the first time since the week of April 2, none of Oklahoma has a "nothing" drought classification.
The northeast and central Oklahoma regions that were the lone holdouts have all moved into D0 status this week, which is where Tulsa County remains. As noted
in yesterday's "Cow" introduction, Tulsa National Weather Service has reported no rainfall in Tulsa since Aug. 16.
Southwest Oklahoma's Jackson County is this week's biggest loser unfortunately, going from D3 to mostly D4 this week.
All of the Panhandle is now under D2 or D3, including westernmost Cimarron, which moved into all D3, and easternmost Beaver, which lost its spot of D1, moving into D2 and D3 countywide.
However, there is good news for some. Check out this Oklahoma Mesonet map of the 24-hour rainfall statewide:
The parched Panhandle got up to 2.73 inches of rain overnight.
Also, Tulsa has a 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms today and tonight (check out local forecast at
tulsaworld.com/weather). It's a slim chance, but we've seen a lot of slight rain chances materialize this summer.
I'll be back Friday with the weekly milestone update.
Hope for rain!
--Althea Peterson
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YOUR IN-DEPTH LOCAL NEWS SOURCE: Visit tulsaworld.com throughout the day for local breaking news and investigative reports about Tulsa and northeastern Oklahoma.
