After experiencing one of the wettest holiday seasons on record, still-soggy California reached a milestone this week: having zero abnormally dry areas for the first time in 25 years.
The data, collected by the U.S. Drought Monitor, is good news for Golden State residents, who in just the past 15 years have experienced two of the worst droughts on record, the worst wildfire seasons on record and the most destructive wildfires on record.
Right now, California’s wildfire risk is “as close to zero as it’s ever been,” and there’s probably no need to worry about the state’s water supply for the rest of the year, said Daniel Swain, a UC climatologist. Currently, 14 of the state’s 17 major water supply reservoirs are operating at 70% or more capacity, according to the California Department of Water Resources.
California’s last drought lasted more than 1,300 days, from February 2020 to October 2023, when only 0.7% of the state remained abnormally dry, thanks to a series of winter atmospheric rivers that drenched the Golden State with rain.
Before that, California experienced a severe drought from 2012 to 2016.
But the last time 0 percent of California’s map showed any level of abnormally dry conditions, or drought, was December 2000. In recent weeks, a series of powerful winter storms and atmospheric rivers swept through California, dumping heavy rains that soaked soils, filled reservoirs and left much of the state unusually wet for this time of year.
“This is certainly a less destructive winter than last year and many years of drought, so it’s okay to take this pause and recognize that right now things are good,” Swain said. He noted, however, that “as we move forward, we expect to be faced with increasingly extreme (weather) fluctuations.”
Although it may seem counterintuitive, climate change is expected to lead to both more intense droughts and more intense precipitation events. This is because a warmer atmosphere extracts more moisture from soils and plants, thus worsening droughts. At the same time, a warmer atmosphere traps more water vapor, which is then released during fewer, more extreme rainstorms.
Scientists have coined a name for this phenomenon – the atmospheric sponge effect – which Swain says “is hopefully an evocative visual analogy that describes why, as the climate warms, we are likely to see wider gaps between extremely wet and extremely dry conditions.”
A key example of this effect is the weather situation that preceded the devastating Palisades and Eaton fires last year.
In 2022 and 2023, California experienced extremely wet winters. Mammoth Mountain, for example, set an all-time snowfall record during the 2022-23 season.
But then Southern California experienced one of the driest periods on record in the fall and winter of 2024, enabling the subsequent devastation of the January 2025 firestorm.
“We didn’t even need a notable multi-year drought for this sequence of very wet to very dry conditions to take us to a place where the fire risk was catastrophic,” Swain said.
Recent storms have brought snow to the Sierra Nevada Mountains, but the state’s snowpack remains below average. According to the Department of Water Resources, the snowpack is now at 89% of average for this time of year.
Much of the West has seen warmer than average temperatures and relatively little snow so far this winter. Snow in the Rocky Mountains remains well below average, adding to strains on the overused Colorado River, a major water source in Southern California.
Research published in the wake of the fire examines how this extremely wet to extremely dry weather sequence is particularly dangerous for wildfires in Southern California because heavy rains lead to heavy growth of grass and brush, which then becomes abundant fuel during periods of extreme drought.
Fortunately, California should be safe from water supply hazards and wildfires for several months, Swain said, but in the long term, residents should expect to see more of this weather whiplash.
Time staff Writer Ian James contributed to this report.
