Drought conditions continue to worsen

Occasional downpours may have punctuated the last couple of weeks, but Crook County is not out of the woods when it comes to drought. In fact, the situation has continued to worsen, with approximately one third of the county now listed as under extreme drought.

The western portion of the county is now entirely classified at extreme drought level, just one level below the most extreme drought conditions included in the U.S. Drought Monitor’s scale.

The eastern third of Crook County is meanwhile mostly under severe drought, with a thin sliver of moderate drought on the eastern border.

Conditions have been impacted in Crook County, like the rest of the western half of the High Plains region, by above-normal temperatures over the last week. The High Plains region as a whole is still suffering the effects of a lack of snowpack due to the below-normal rainy season throughout the spring.

According to the Water Resources Data System, most of the county has less than 25% of its median snow water equivalent at this time. The system also shows Keyhole Reservoir is now at just 75% of capacity, having dropped from over 90% at this time last year.

The Belle Fourche River is currently at around one foot below Moorcroft and four feet at the South Dakota state line, according to the National Weather Service’s Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service. For context, 12 to 13 feet is the level at which flooding of this river becomes a possibility.

According to the National Integrated Drought Information System, this June was the third driest in the last 127 years with 2.15 fewer inches of rainfall than usual. This year as a whole has been the second driest in that time, with 4.85 fewer inches than normal.

The National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center predicts that the whole county has a greater than 40% chance of seeing below-normal precipitation over the next month.

Over the last month, most of the county has experienced temperatures around one degree higher than normal, while the northwestern quarter has seen temperatures around three degrees above average for this time of the year.

The drought and high temperatures are, of course, impacting the fire danger in this area. As the week began, the National Weather Service issued a red flag warning due to the high temperatures, gusty winds and low relative humidity, which combine to create critical fire weather conditions.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicts that drought conditions will persist over the next three months.