The Reason for Drought the Last Few Years

In the most recent issue of Science Drs. Hoerling and Kumar with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) published a research article on the reason for drought from 1998-2002 (Hoerling, M. and A. Kumar. 2003. The perfect ocean for drought. Science 299:691-694.) The droughts that occurred during 1998 through 2002 and spanned the United States, southern Europe, and Southwest Asia were linked to cold sea surface temperatures in the eastern tropical Pacific and warm sea surface temperatures in western tropical Pacific and Indian Oceans. These two phenomena worked together to produce widespread drying through the mid-latitude. The climate changes that occurred starting in 1998 changed what had been the wettest decade since the 1890's. For more information you can go to NOAA

Authors: Karl Danneberger