Louisiana Drought: 'Rapid-Onset' Concerns

By Jay Grymes

Louisiana State Climatologist

Excessively high temperatures and a general lack of widespread rain have much of Louisiana staring at drought once again, with the CPC noting a good chance that drought will expand across most/all of the Pelican State rather quickly in the upcoming weeks.

"Rapid Onset Drought", sometimes referred to as "flash drought", will be an issue as Louisiana heads into the next couple of weeks.  Keep in mind that this will lead into what is often the "driest" period of the year for Louisiana, especially if the tropics are behaving. 

The Louisiana Drought Team (LDT) provided its weekly input to the national authors for this week's Drought Monitor, placing nearly half of the state in "Moderate Drought" (D1).  The national author(s) were a bit more conservative than the LDT, but they did agree with the expansion of drought for much of the state.

With the current 7-day outlook indicating continued above-normal temperatures (both daily highs and lows) coupled with forecasts suggesting that most of the state likely gets less than 0.5" of rain over the next 7 days, the LDT anticipates another round of widespread drought expansion for next week, with the potential for pockets of "Severe Drought" (D2) with next week's Drought Monitor.

Keep in mind that a dry late-summer/early-fall is not a bad thing for everyone in the state: any on-going harvest operations progress more readily with the dry-out.  And Louisiana's fall festivals get the benefits of cooperative skies too. 

But the on-going dry-out is impacting pastures, freshwater resources, and working in tandem with near-record temperatures to drive energy bills up as well as keeping emergency units hopping with heat-related illnesses.

Wildfires appear to be on the rise as well, demanding resources and manpower, especially in the more rural areas of the state.  Hence, the rapid rise in parish-wide burn bans, going from just one parish (DeSoto) at the start of August to 24 parishes as of Thursday morning (Aug 20).  Expect to see more parishes climb aboard the burn ban wagon in the coming days and weeks.