Thanks to last Friday's light but steady rain, Kern County has seen remarkable improvement in our drought ranking.
The weekly report from the US Drought Monitor this morning ranks most of Kern County as "Abnormally Dry", otherwise known as the lowest level. According to the report, that ranking is "used for areas showing dryness but not yet in drought, or for areas recovering from drought".
The Frazier Park region is still considered to be in "Moderate Drought" but that is an improvement from last week as well.
The report reads: "Storms continued to drop heavy precipitation over parts of California, leading to widespread improvements of the multi-year drought in the state, although some pockets have missed out on the precipitation and water restrictions remain due to low reservoir levels. A few large–scale improvements were made in central and southern California... Improvements were also made across the San Joaquin Valley, with snowpack well above 100% in the Sierras. Reservoirs are being replenished across most regions. At the foot of the Sequoia National Forest, Lake Isabella’s water level increased 20 percent." You can read the full report here.
A powerful Atmospheric River event is bringing soaking rain to Kern County Friday. With 4-5 inches of rain potential over the Grapevine, 3 inches forecasted for Tehachapi and 2-3 inches in the Kern River Canyon, by this time next week we could potentially be out of the drought completely. But onviously all of that rain at once is a very dangerous situation, and we are looking at the chance of mudslides, rockslides, flash flooding and debris flows Friday. Click here to read the full storm forecast.
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