Your Weekly Drought Report: How Has Missouri Not Turned to Dust?

By Paul Friswold Thu., Aug. 16 2012 at 3:26 PM

Categories: Environment, Follow That Story

Ugh. Just ugh.

Stop me if you've heard this one before: The U.S. Drought Monitor releases its weekly report on drought conditions in America; a map is included in the report; Missouri looks like a fire-withered slice of pepperoni on that map.

Yes, drought conditions have worsened. Although we experienced a marginal increase in the percentage of the state that qualifies for the D3-D4 categorization (up to 94.68 from 94.56), there has been a massive jump in the percentage of the state that hits the D4 classification -- it's more than doubled, up to 35.51 percent from last week's 13.89 percent.

Judging by the map, the western side of the Missouri may be an extension of the Mojave desert.

Even more amazing, every other state in the Midwest region experienced some relief in the past week. Even Illinois saw the percentage of D3-D4 and D4 drought territory decrease this week.

But not Missouri. Oh no, not Missouri. Missouri continues to bake under the relentless sun, growing more and more parched. I'm pretty sure I saw a Shai Hulud moving through Forest Park last week.