Record Dry Spell Plagues East Coast
C A M P S P R I N G S, Maryland, Feb. 18 -- An unusually warm, dry summer and winter has resulted in the East Coast's worst drought in years.
In Maine, it's the worst on record. Wells are running dry. In southern Maine, Debbie Angelides was without water for more than a month while she waited for a suddenly busy drilling company to dig a new well.
It made for some long trips to the shower — at her in-laws' home, 35 miles away.
"We went about every third day, which is 35 miles away," she said. "You just can't believe what it's like without water. ... You know, just little things, like brushing your teeth at night."
Lake Champlain at 30-Year Low
Vermont's Lake Champlain is at its lowest level in 30 years, exposing parts of old shipwrecks. Officials from the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum in Basin Harbor, Vt., have been investigating sites never seen before.
In upstate New York, the reservoirs for New York City are at about half their normal capacity. At the Cannonsville Reservoir, which was formed when the town of Downsville was flooded in 1964, the water was so low that the abandoned town's streets, sidewalks and foundations could be seen.
Droughts have been declared in parts of 15 states from Georgia to Maine, and 14 states in the Midwest and West.
But it's especially bad in the Northeast.
Parts of Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Connecticut are under drought emergencies, with mandatory water restrictions.
No Quick Fix
It will take more than just one or two days of rain or snow to make up for last year — the fourth-driest ever in the Northeast. And the last three months of last year were the second-driest ever, leaving reservoirs, rivers and lakes at record-low levels.
It will take a series of storms to saturate the soil before water runoff starts replenishing water supplies.
The drought is the result of a long-term weather pattern that's often kept the jet stream north of the Great Lakes since last spring. That means was moist air from the Gulf of Mexico hasn't been carried up the East Coast.
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