Summer Rainfall Not Enough For Drought

Just last week, 15 counties in Montana were declared disaster areas due to the dry weather this year, and although Missoula did see some rainfall last week, national weather service hydrologist Ray Nickless says it wasn’t enough.

"So far for this month, we have had .87 inches of precipitation," Nickless said. "Normally, we have .66 inches. So, we are slightly above the normal but if you look at precipitation we've had since January 1st we've had 5.3 inches and normally we have 8.5 inches. So are still 3.5 inches deficit there."

Nickless says that the warm weather in June and early July contributed to the high levels of evaporation which increased fire danger levels.

"We did get some precipitation in spots and that certainly helped to keep things, especially the fire danger I think more than anything at bay," Nickless said. "It will take a good 2-3 inches of precipitation as we go through time here to get us back to where we feel somewhat comfortable of easing our way out of this drought."

Cooler temperatures are expected later this week along with some rainfall, but it is not expected to be enough to end the drought.