Weather
Modest Drought Improvement for part of the Heartland
The November 2013 Drought Outlook is based on initial conditions, short and medium range forecasts, updated monthly outlooks for temperature and precipitation, and climatology.
During late October, heavy rains ahead of a slow moving cold front fell across parts of south-central and southeastern Texas, causing localized flooding in Austin and regions just to the southwest. Widespread rainfall associated with the same storm system also overspread eastern Kansas, Missouri, southern Iowa, and northern Illinois, with accumulations of an inch or greater observed. Additional rainfall in these areas are expected during the first week of November, as ridging builds over the Southeast, promoting slow frontal passages as new mid-latitude storms develop across the Mississippi Valley. Therefore, drought improvement or removal is anticipated across south central and eastern Texas and along the middle and lower Mississippi Valley.
Further east, the ridging over the Southeast is forecast to prevent significant rainfall from reaching the Atlantic coast. Drought development is possible across parts of the Southeast, especially along the Savannah River basin, where 30-day percent of normal precipitation values are particularly low. Drought has also expanded across parts of the Northeast, and without a clear signal for wetness during the first half of November, persistence is anticipated. Uncertainty increases towards the end of the month, as coastal winter storms become more likely.
November is a climatologically dry time of year across the Plains and intermountain West, making drought persistence most probable.
Winter storm activity increases across the Pacific Northwest during late autumn, but sufficient precipitation to overcome current drought conditions is not likely to occur until later in the winter season, especially across California.
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