​The snow may be inconvenient, but it's helping Minnesota's dry conditions

66% of Minnesota was abnormally dry according to last week's drought monitor, although there was no drought reported in the Twin Cities.

Minnesota DNR Climatologist Pete Boulay says a lot of the snowpack went away across central and southern Minnesota prior to this weekend's storm, which minimizes flooding risks.

"We would get concerned if there was still like 4 or 5 inches of water in the snowpack, and there really isn't that right now because we pretty much lost all our winter snow we had," says Boulay. "We were running behind."

Boulay says thawed out ground in southern Minnesota will help when it comes to absorbing all the snow from over the weekend.

But this latest batch of snow from the weekend certainly doesn't hurt.

"Pretty much, Twin Cities on south from this, the storm we got over the weekend, and that really helped out our moisture situation quite a bit," he explains. "Anywhere from 0.5 inch to over 1 inch to in some places in southeast Minnesota 1.5, 1.75 inches of precipitation from all that snow. So that'll definitely help things out."

He adds that last week the Duluth area was the worst area in terms of severe drought.

"In the Duluth area they're certainly making up for lost ground there," Boulay adds. "And then also in southern Minnesota too, it has been nice to see a little more snowfall in far southwestern Minnesota. They got some, not as much as southeastern Minnesota, but right now we'll take any moisture we can get."

There are still a handful of areas in the state that are abnormally dry and some that are in moderate drought as we head towards spring.