Nws Birmingham Weather Image 1 — (NWS Birmingham)

Alabama is finally shaking off its dry spell.

A slow-moving weather system pulling moisture from the Gulf of Mexico just dropped a massive amount of rain across the Southeast. Western and northern Alabama saw anywhere from 2 to 6 inches of rain, while east-central counties picked up around an inch.

All that water soaked into the ground, perfectly balancing out rising spring temperatures and natural evaporation.

Extreme drought is gone — for now

The impact of these storms is huge. Back in late April, central and southern Alabama were completely locked down by extreme drought conditions.

According to the latest data from the Alabama Office of the State Climatologist at UAH, extreme drought (D3) coverage in the state has officially dropped to 0%.

Here is how the rest of the state shapes up right now:

Abnormally dry (D0): 18.99% coverage
Moderate drought (D1): 48.75% coverage
Severe drought (D2): 32.26% coverage

More than half of the state is now sitting in the lowest two categories, which is a massive upgrade from where things stood just one month ago.

Looking ahead

While short-term conditions look great, the recovery isn’t entirely finished. A few eastern counties are still dealing with lower streamflows and leftover precipitation deficits from earlier in the year.

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