The winter storms pretty much erased the drought in most of California
CNN
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California has faced an onslaught of powerful, atmospheric river storms this winter, which has led to record-breaking snowpack, nearly full reservoirs and overflowing watersheds.
At this time last year, all of California was caught in a drought. But according to the latest US Drought Monitor released Thursday morning, just over a third of California remains in some level of drought – the lowest amount since the drought began – with severe drought only covering 8% of the state.
For the last three years, the state has been in desperate need of some rain and snow. Just a month ago, more than 33 million people in California, including in the major metropolitan areas of Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego, were facing an unrelenting drought. Years of unfavorable precipitation trends and more intense heat waves have fed directly to the state’s prolonged, historic megadrought that has triggered dire water shortages.
Now, that number has dropped dramatically, with 4.6 million people still facing drought conditions.