'"
r ·s
E. �lly Davis
I;Pl1l"!naem·M&J
The dreams of state drought I oni tors
are coming true.
A confluence of happy but unpredicted
events have come together in the last few
months to slake South Carolina and
Georgia's short-term thirst for water and
go a long way toward ending the five-year
"hydrologic drought" that has drained the
region's deeper water supplies.
The South Carolina Drought Response
Comm ittee meets next Thursday and is
expected to sign ifican tly lower the state's
drought status. and possibly lift it altogeth­
er in some areas.
In Georgia. S tate Climatologist David
Stooksbury said the short-term drought is
over and the outlook for long·term recovery
is bright.
This summer, no one would have expect­
ed talk of an end to the drought so soon.
It would have taken an onslaught of trop­
ical storms right over the Southeast when
in the last four years, one or fewer was the
I l U ' m. SU l . 1 I . ' 113 ac:
Cl l :lla !()l(jgi�t Milt l ::n sa id.
The western hemis;Jhen I lso was e n ter·
ing an El N ino period. Altl,uugh thal phe·
nomenon increases winter ra i nfall
throughout the southern United States. it
also depresses tropical storm activity in
the Atlantic.
That made the possibility of an unusual­
ly wet October and Nove mber - usuaUy
the driest two months of the year - seem
remote.
" Tt looked kind of bleak then." Mr.
Brown said, recaliing this summer when
the drought committee decided to down­
grade most of the state to severe drought
and the thirsty Pee Dee to extreme drought.
"\ don't think anybody could have guessed
we would have been in this good of condi­
tion."
That "good condition" means a normal
amount of soil moisture that also is con·
nected to the deeper water table, allowing
Please see Rains, Page 7A
State
Ra ' may j e in t e coId a1 "
ing
this weeken 1 rU-r s t a e
By Charmaine Smith
IndependeOl·MdJ.!
Grab the blankets � nd the
um breUas because the National
Weather Service is callir 's for rain
and be low normal temperatures
this · ·eekend.
The National Weather Service.
based in Greer. says residents in
the Upstate and northeast
Georgia have a 40 percent chance
of seeing rain fall in their area
today with most of it expected to
clear by Saturday afternoon. said
one of the service's meteorolo·
gists. Rodney H inson.
Once the rain has cleared a
band of cold high pressure will
move into the area. bringing cold­
er temperatures and windy
.
weat� . ':' li : , ::' �Ulda'.:
A normal high for Sunday
would be 61 degrees. but this
Sunday the mercury is expected
to reach into the mere 40s and
drop into the 30s by nightfall.
Counties bordering North
Carolina and Tennessee might
even see some snowflakes before
the weekend is over, Mr. Hinson
said. Saturday's forecast rairLfall
is expected to turn into snow far·
ther north. and some accumula­
tion is expected in the higher ele­
vations.
Temperat ures should warm
back up to the mid-50s on Monday
and continue to rise until
Thursday, when another storm
front is expected, Mr. Hinson said.
. 1
From Page lA

rain to contribute to ground­

water rather than evaporating
or wetting the topsoil alone,
he said. .
The drought committee will
probably upgrade most of the
state to incipient drought, and
may upgrade the coastal areas
to non-drought status, he said.
The committee got that
chance because the region did
get the wetter October and
November it needed, when the
southern ' jet. stream was
pushed farther ' north than
usual, Mr. Brown said.
Although El Nino caused
fewer named tropical storms
this year than last, more of
them came ashore - at least
four - and that helped water
Georgia and South Carolina,
too, he said.
Finally, El Nino will con­
tribute to deeper water sup­
plies by giving the Southeast a
wet winter. It is during the
coming cold months that rain­
fall most efficiently gets deep
underground.
That will help coastal
aquifers and the Upstate's
strained rock wells a chance
to recover, said Clemson
Un iversity agricultural mete­
orologist Dale Linvill.
The water level in the shal­
low wells should rise up to 4
feet by this spring, although
that's not enough to return
them to mid-1990s levels, he
said. Not until then can the
long-term drought be declared
dead and buried.
"Everyone can recognize
the end of a short-term
drought, the drought that
affects green and growing
things," Mr. Linvill said. "Not
everyone recognizes when
we're getting out ,of a long­
term drought."