Western Drought Beats Dust Bowl, Could Be Worst in 500 Years

[CShine]

The drought gripping the West could be the biggest in 500 years, with effects in the Colorado River basin considerably worse than during the Dust Bowl years, scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey said Thursday.

"That we can now say with confidence," said Robert Webb, lead author of the new fact sheet. "Now I'm completely convinced."

The Colorado River has been in a drought for the entire decade, cutting an important source of water for millions of people across the West, including Southern California. Environmental groups said the report reinforces the need to figure out a better way to manage the Colorado River before reservoirs run dry.

<snip>

The report said the drought has produced the lowest flow in the Colorado River on record, with an adjusted annual average flow of only 5.4 million acre-feet at Lees Ferry, Ariz., during the period 2001-2003. By comparison, during the Dust Bowl years, between 1930 and 1937, the annual flow averaged about 10.2 million acre-feet, the report said.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBI1GWLLVD.html

[no_arbusto]

1. But they have such lovely green grass out west.

EOM

[DavidDvorkin]

2. Ours is getting less green all the time

We have a constitutional right to lush bluegrass lawns, damn it!

[PartyPooper]

4. not too mention

verdant golf courses and sparkling swimming pools, too.

;-)

[Warpy]

7. Lawns here in New Mexico are getting harder to find.

There is only one left on my block, and it's struggling, even though it's under a mulberry tree and well shaded from the desert sun.

I managed to get my lawn to kick the bucket about five years ago. Eventually, I'll start planting native plants, but for now, it's just dirt with a tree sticking out of the middle of it.

The problem is up in the mountains. All the native trees are being destroyed by bark beetles. There are few healthy trees left. Soon the whole business will burn, but unless we get rain to germinate the seed left behind, those forests will be gone.

The one positive thing is that the state has finally started to get serious about eradicating salt cedar and Russian olive trees from the riverbanks, massively water wasting non native species.

Even the golf courses here are starting to convert to artificial turf on the fairways. Lawn grass was always a silly idea out here. I'm glad the drought came along, in a way, and finally convinced people of that fact.

[bleedingheart]

18. I have seen some really lovely native gardens for the SouthWest

and I can't imagine trying to foster a lawn similar to those in the NorthEast out there...

[Gildor Inglorion]

3. hmmmm....

I wonder if any conservation methods have been invoked for the affected area? I seem to remember reading somewhere that Las Vegas has the highest per capita water use in the country.

[madaboutharry]

5. That's because of all

the showers William Bennent has to take when he's in Vegas.

[Aunt Anti-bush]

6. And here in the east:

We're ready to float away. My yard has become like a moat around the house.

http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/severeweather/953036/detail.html

The NWS in pittsburgh has issued a


flash flood warning for: westmoreland county in pennsylvania
Until 1230 am edt
At 922 pm edt, flash flooding was indicated by radar rainfall estimates of over two inches of rain in the past two hours across extreme northern westmoreland county near new kensington and lower burrell. Rapid rises in stream levels can be expected.
Other locations in the warning include, north Washington,
be especially cautious at night when it is harder to recognize the dangers of floods and flash floods. If flash flooding is observed act quickly. Move to higher ground to escape flood waters. Do not stay in areas subject to flooding when water begins rising.

[Doctor Smith]

8. I rode my bicycle 40 miles along the Colorado river today.

It looked just dandy here near the headwaters.
Sorry for you folks downstream.

[Dogmudgeon]

9. Meanwhile, the North Atlantic is unseasonably cold

Nothing record-breaking yet, but chilly for this time of year.

I'm still calling for this summer to be the world cham-peen all-time hot summer. Predicting it ... Prophesying it. I'll accept #2 as a 50-50. #3 or below, count me as a failure in the soothsaying department.

--bkl
:crazy:

[Vogon_Glory]

10. The Wingnuts And The Rocky Mountain West

Right wingnuts have failed and failed consistently to consider the role of water west of Nebraska and, typical of the breed, fail to consider what effects that climate change and drought can have on people trying to live in that region. They choose to remain blind despite the visible and frightening evidence in front of them--such as barren onetime lake beds like the Bonneville Salt Flats and Death Valley, as well as the far more recently abandoned cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde and elsewhere.

I am almost convinced that the only way to be a right-wing "fibbertarian" and remain in happy ignorance concerning climate and water supply is to dwell at least thirty miles away from the ocean shore line and well away from any watershed dependent on snow melt for its headwaters.

[dusty64]

11. Sounds like a disaster in the

making to me. Whats being done about it?

[Tansy_Gold]

13. absolutely nothing

Although we may end up having the Brazilian cotton farmers to thank for at least some amelioration. Even so, it will probably come too late.

Vast amounts of water are used in Arizona (and probably New Mexico and Texas, too) to irrigate cotton farms. The cotton is heavily subsidized by the govt -- and most of the cotton farmers are RW anti-government republicans -- to the point that we have a huge surplus and other countries are filing WTO suits.

Tansy Gold, Arizonan who watches the desert be bulldozed for little boxes made of ticky-tacky with their little green lawns and massive golf courses but who has no lawn herself, hasn't had one for almost 20 years, and DOESN'T WANT ONE

[harper]

12. Western Kansas

I talked to a dear friend of mine the other night. She had just gotten back from visiting her family home near Russell Ks. She said its been terribly dry out there.

She was at an alumni dinner at the local (now closed) country school she attended in the 1940's. They were waiting in line for dinner when they noticed a black cloud off to the west. Maybe rain! As they got into the school building and sat down to eat, it got dark as night outside, then a wind blew up and they heard a sound like hail hitting the roof.

No rain...it was a dust storm with clods of dirt hitting the roof. Rosalie said she remember seeing storms like that when she was a girl in the 1930's. And now they're back. But, of course, there is no evidence of global climate change.

[Crachet2004]

14. WV is now pretty much a rainforest...

We have had two pretty major mudslides just on my 3 mile long road this year-and this is something that has never happened before. One of them is a continuing thing...it just keeps oozing like lava across the road. The State came and fixed the other one by capping everything with asphalt. Clay can only hold so much water before it becomes a fluid itself, I guess. And it has RAINED. And rained. And rained.

It rains in the spring and rains in the fall...and increasingly, it has been raining in the winter, instead of snow. Now, I guess it is gonna start raining in the summer, too. It is raining now.

A couple of years ago, in late winter, it was raining when it should have been snowing...the temperature was just right and everything began to freeze. It rained and froze for two days and nights, with no letup. This is called an 'ice-storm'. Then the trees began to come down. I live in a rural county with a lot of trees...WV is really one big forest, cut through by roads, a few towns and small cities, and various other infrastructure installations.

When the trees started to fall, you could hear a crash or a boom probably ten times a minute, coming from all around. The power went out, but my house is propane-I did this on purpose-so we could cook and had hot water. The phones went out, but we have cell phones.

It took two of us a day to cut our way a couple of hundred feet out to the road with chainsaws...that many trees across the road. The power was out for two weeks, by which time we had bought a generator, and were pretty much back to normal. Lowe's was bringing generators in by the tractor-trailor load.

My father who is 75 says he never saw anything like it.

I think global warming is a reality. The weather is changing, and the RATE of change is speeding up.

[harper]

15. What I'm seeing here in Missouri is a weather pattern shift

Last couple of years we have had tons of rain in the spring then it just shuts off. So far we are right on target. We are waterlogged with flash flooding. This morning about 5am we had a storm were it dumped half an inch in about 20 minute.

But, it could stop raining any time and we could bake the months of July and August. Just like it did last summer.

[LeftyDonkey]

16. Every now and then

we hear rumors that the dry southwest wants to make a huge pipeline across the plains and pump in freshwater from the Great Lakes. Now, living in the Great Lakes region, I find this unbelievably stupid. Any DUers from the Southwest hear local politicians speaking of such things?

[htuttle]

19. The last time I heard that discussed....

...I think I remember hearing about all the state governors in the region, along with the leaders of the Great Lakes-bounding Canadian provinces, getting together to issue a collective , "No way!" about piping water from the Great Lakes.

As a Wisconsin resident, I'd say, "Not in your dreams!" to that idea.

[Bandit]

20. Rumors are around about a pipeline from Alaska also

Glacier water piped down to the desert. Won't be long until water is worth more than oil.

[LeftyDonkey]

23. Will...

water companies be the oil companies of the 21st century? Move over Shell, here comes Coca-Cola/Aquafina? Excellent article in Mother Jones sometime within the last year on this very subject (privatization of water resources, that is)

[uptown ruler]

17. bumpy ride..

it takes about 400 gallons of oil to grow the food each of us, us americans that is, per year. this drought may make it even more "oil" expensive, and what with the rise in oil prices themselves, we may be looking at extended price hikes for food.

mourn the breadbasket!


Spread the Word
CausePimpingThePeopleAin’tEasy

[denverbill]

21. Oddly enough, we've had 3 straight days of rain.

I read this in our paper this AM, but it was just odd to see it in the paper considering how much it's rained in Denver recently.

Prior to the last 3 days however, it had been a long dry spell.

[maxsolomon]

22. all part of the predicted patterns

10 years & the folly of las vegas will become more than evident. if anyone wants to get angrier, read cadillac desert, on the damming of the west.

western washington is the new california.