Extremely dry weather persists in portions of Central Texas, and hopes for significant rainfall remain low, at least for the present. The Western Climate Research Center monitors drought conditions across the U.S. and has five levels to describe precipitation deficienies. These are: Abnormally Dry, Moderate Drought, Severe Drought, Extreme Drought, and Exceptional Drought.

The latest data from the U.S. Drought Monitor, which focuses on broad-scale conditions, shows an area of Exceptional Drought over the eastern Texas Hill Country and adjacent portions of South Central Texas, extending into the coastal plains east of San Antonio and Austin. Surrounding that area is a large area of extreme drought, the northern edge of which is along a line from Caldwell to Lampasas to east of San Angelo. Severe drought is indicated south of a line from Caldwell to Temple to near Abilene. Moderate drought to abnormally dry conditions cover the remainder of Central Texas, eventhough the Waco airport recorded slightly more than normal rainfall in 2008. Such was not the case across Bell County, where the annual rainfall (based on still unofficial totals) ranged from 17 to 24 inches, far below normal. With so much of the area suffering from drought conditions, we are closely monitoring the Climate Prediction Center's outlooks for the coming one-month and three-month periods. The links below will display the one-month and three-month outlooks of both temperature and precipitation.