Despite our rainy spring, parts of Washington State are in a drought and expected to remain there.
The US Drought Monitor map shows Central Oregon is in the worst shape with a large area seeing “exceptional drought”, but a large swath of eastern Washington is in “moderate drought” or “severe drought” with counties along part of the Columbia River basin in “extreme drought”.
Jeff Marti with the Washington State Department of Ecology says it’s unlikely farmers who depend on the Columbia and larger river areas will see their water restricted, but he says there are some watersheds in north central and eastern Washington where it’s too soon to tell but that it’s possible some junior water right holders could see the spigots turned off. “The senior water right holders get precedence over the junior water right holders,” Marti says, “meaning that we would regulate the junior water right holders in order to ensure that the senior water right holders get their full supply.” That’s something Marti says they likely won’t know until much later in the summer.
We’re also expecting another warm summer, but the experts say we’re not likely to see the extreme heat we saw last summer. Western Washington’s soil moisture is in good shape, and they say that can help keep temperatures down.
They couldn’t predict smoke conditions for the summer. That’s something they can usually only predict as much as 10 days out, but with the west so dry, we can expect wildfires that will have our air pretty smoky at times.
