MITCHELL, SD (Mitchell Now) — South Dakota’s latest drought update shows the state dividing into haves and have-nots.
A persistent system of isolated, strong thunderstorms have helped dramatically in areas where they dropped several inches of rain over the past couple weeks. But in areas that needed the rain the worst, they mostly stayed dry.
The percentage of the state that is drought free did not change over the past week, holding steady at 17.04%. The amount that is just abnormally dry, the weakest stage on the drought monitor scale, grew to 30.23% as spots that were previously drought-stricken begin to soak up water again.
Areas experiencing moderate drought fell to 18.38% of the state, but that’s where the good news ends. The amount of the state in severe drought held mostly steady and the section of the state in extreme drought grew from 9.19% to 11.38%.
Davison and Hanson Counties are two examples where things took a clear turn for the worse. Last week, both counties had no extreme drought. This week, a little over a quarter of Davison is in extreme drought and more than a third of Hanson. Another patch has formed in parts of Lake, Minnehaha, and Moody Counties. McCook is once again dominated by severe drought, compared to just 10.5% of the county a week ago.
Light rain has fallen in the Mitchell area early Thursday, but sunny skies and breezy conditions are expected to dominate for much of the next week. The severe storms on Tuesday night into Wednesday were not major rain events, but they will also be included in next week’s update.