Thu, 22 Dec 2022 10:48:59 CST
The latest Drought Monitor shows just slight changes to the drought numbers across the state of Oklahoma.
Starting with Exceptional drought- 11.65 percent of the state remains in the D4 drought category- virtually the same as the 11.65 percent number of a week ago.
In the Extreme Drought or worse category (D3)- this week’s 56.13 percent is slightly less than the 57.35 percent of last week.
The Severe Drought or worse category (D2) shows 80.92 percent which is down a little over 2 percentage points from the 83.45 percent last week
The Moderate Drought or worse category(D1) stands at 89.73 percent versus 90.18 percent. It’s interesting to note that Oklahoma has been in moderate drought or worse for all of 2022- as the start of the calendar year had the state at 90.17 percent in the D1 or worse category.
Finally, the Abnormally Dry or worse category (D0) is at 98.18 percent versus 98.45 percent last week for Oklahoma.
According to the summary developed for this week’s Monitor- in the south that includes Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas- Moderate to heavy rain fell this week across the eastern half of the south region, roughly to the east of Interstate 35 in Texas and Oklahoma. Due to increasing streamflow and soil moisture, and decreasing precipitation deficits, improvements were made across much of the eastern half of the region, including a small part of eastern Oklahoma, much of Arkansas, east Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee. In parts of Texas that missed out on the rains, degradations were made in a few spots where precipitation deficits, and in some cases streamflow deficits, mounted. Widespread severe, extreme and exceptional drought continued across much of central and western Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle.
Click here for the US Drought Monitor Map as released Thursday morning, December 22nd.
Click here for the Oklahoma Drought Monitor as released Thursday morning, December 22nd.
