The next month will be pivotal in how long a potential drought in Minnesota may last.
After the driest September on record, Minnesota is on pace for one of the driest Octobers in 40 years. The result is extreme drought in much of the Twin Cities’ metro and one that can't be solved with just one or two precipitation events.
Peter Boulay with the Minnesota State Climatology Office says there is no quick-fix now that we’re heading into winter.
“The best-case scenario is we don’t get the drought getting worse,” Boulay says. “We can at least hold steady where we’re at. We’re right now, since June 1st, almost 10 inches short of precipitation in the Twin Cities. There’s no way we’re going to make that up before the ground freezes. At best we might get an inch or two.”
That hard freeze normally happens around Thanksgiving. Once the ground freezes, water can't get into the soil, meaning not much can be done about the drought until the ground thaws in the spring. That means we should hope for plenty of rain or an early snowfall in the next month.
It likely won’t matter though.
“I can pretty much guarantee this drought will still be around in 2023,” Boulay predicts.
Minnesota has had .24 inches (that’s 24-hundreths) in the Twin Cities thus far in September and October.
The state is reaching rare territory with so little rain this year.
“Believe it or not the record for the driest October in the Twin Cities is only .01 of an inch in 1952, so there’s been some dry Octobers,” Boulay says. “However you put October with September, put them together, we’re the second driest October and September put together. And if you go all the way back to June 1st, we’re also the second driest June 1st through October too.”
The latest drought report shows most of the Twin Cities is in extreme drought, and it's reached some of the lakes and rivers. Lake Minnetonka is now at its lowest level since 1991 says Boulay. The Crow, Zumbro and Sauk Rivers are nearing record-lows as well.
Boulay says at this point, it's beginning to rival historic droughts of the past.
“We’re starting to see kind of reactions in lakes we last saw in the ’88 drought era in the Twin Cities,” Boulay tells WCCO. He adds that the low levels seen in Lake Minnetonka in 1991 were a direct result of the drought of 1988, so those effects can be long-lasting.
Boulay says small rivers are being hit the hardest, while the bigger rivers haven't been quite as affected.
“The Mississippi isn’t really that low because the headwaters received a lot more rain during the year,” he says. “Basically, St. Cloud on north isn’t even in drought right now.”
Dry weather is far from being just a Twin Cities problem. 53% of the country is in drought, the highest level since 2012.
WCCO Chief Meteorologist Paul Douglas says there are no major rain (or snow) events in the forecast. Minnesota is under a bubble of high pressure, with seasonably warm temperatures, low humidity – and no chances of rain over the next week-plus.
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