...But National Weather Service (click title to entry - thank you) meteorologists caution that the recent downpour isn't expected to counteract the overall drought, which Texas state climatologist said earlier this month could last a decade. Before this weekend, 88% of Texas was experiencing exceptional drought conditions, according to the weekly national drought monitor published on Thursdays.
“That’s how big of a hole we were in to begin with,” said Victor Murphy, southern region climate service program manager for the National Weather Service in Fort Worth.
Murphy told The Times that the state needs more than 15 inches of rain in a month's time to end the current drought, especially in hard-hit portions of Central and West Texas.
Take Wichita Falls, for example. The city of 104,000 about 140 miles northwest of Dallas has been suffering from the drought and a severe summer heat wave. Although the city received 3.73 inches of rain over the weekend as of Tuesday, it was still the city's driest year on record by two inches, with only 9.44 inches of rain since January.
Murphy called the weekend rains a “black swan” event, which mostly helped a swath of the state from Wichita Falls west to Llano.
“It will be very interesting to see what kind of improvement is shown this week in the Drought Monitor,” Murphy said....
