The recent onslaught of rain has been both good and bad, across the board. Teetering on the better side: California’s major water reservoirs are in their comeback era.
Hallelujah: For the first time in over three years, the San Francisco Bay Area is not experiencing any drought levels. 44% of California now also falls in that same drought-free category.
The most recent atmosphere river dropped inches of rain across California, all while sending 50-plus mph winds across San Francisco; residential buildings saw panes of glass fall hundreds of feet to the ground; a local beer company took the heavy winds to produce some *chef’s kiss* social media content that surely attracted customers.
As a result, drought conditions that have plagued the Golden State continue their path to improvement, albeit with instances of flooding and snow-ins. And, for the first time in literally years, the vast majority of the SF Bay Area is now officially out of drought conditions.
At the start of our water year on October 1st, more than 99% of California was in a drought. Fast forward to today after numerous winter storms, only 36% of the state is in a drought which is the best conditions since April 2020. pic.twitter.com/Zzk1nA814L
— Drew Tuma (@DrewTumaABC7) March 16, 2023
“For the 1st time in more than 3 years, most of the Bay Area has completely wiped out the dry/drought conditions on the latest drought monitor,” ABC7 Meteorologist Drew Tuma wrote on Twitter in response to a newly released map from the U.S. Drought Monitor. “Nearly 64% of California is now out of the drought (dry category is not considered drought, only moderate or greater).”
Tuma later tweeted out another statistic to drive home just how welcomingly surreal this is: “At the start of our water year on October 1st, more than 99% of California was in a drought. Fast forward to today after numerous winter storms, only 36% of the state is in a drought which is the best condition since April 2020.”
BREAKING: For the 1st time in more than 3 years, most of the Bay Area has completely wiped out the dry/drought conditions on the latest drought monitor. Nearly 64% of California is now out of the drought (dry category is not considered drought, only moderate or greater). pic.twitter.com/JnrLhxVAO9
— Drew Tuma (@DrewTumaABC7) March 16, 2023
Rainfall like this? We love to see it. What do we also love to see? Major water reservoirs in California are drilling up — including those around Northern California.
According to the California Department of Water Resources, most of NorCal’s largest water reservoirs are now well above 75% full; we’ll take a C+, regardless. Lake Orville, which was at historic lows below 20% in 2021, is now at 83% capacity. Similarly, Lake Sonoma is sitting at 78% — a nearly 200% increase over its 2022 recorded levels. Unfortunately, Lake Trinity remains well below its historical average now at 38% capacity, though it’s inching up and might see more improvements when another storm system descends on NorCal next week.
While we’re not out of the woods yet, we haven’t seen such a broad swath of improvement in California’s major water reservoirs in years.
