Not Necessarily the Worst Drought in 1200 years! - Golden Gate Weather Services

Not Necessarily the Worst Drought in 1200 years!

In the past week there has been extensive media coverage and headlines about "the worst California drought in 1200 years". This was based on a paper to be published in Geophysical Research Letters by the AGU. However a thorough reading of that paper,"How unusual is the 2012-2014 California drought?", indicates that this "worst" declaration should have at least a few asterisks. The article is not inaccurate but it takes only a limited view at looking at the current California drought.

- The study defines drought using the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI). This is an agricultural index, based on soil-moisture as a function of both temperatue and precipitation. While, agriculture is incredibly important in California, it is not necessarily the best metric for the state's overall water deficit and its impacts.

- The paper also does not look at all of California. Instead it only examines the PDSI for central and southern California (i.e. NCDC California Climate Divisions 4, 5, 6, 7). This methodolgy gives a skewed prespective since much of the water used throughout the entire state originates in northern California (i.e., Climate Divisions 1,2,3) and the 3-year deficit has been less there than in the sampled southern two-thirds of the state. [For additional context see the just released NOAA California Drought Assessment.]

The bottom line is that the paper really only speaks to agricultural drought in central and southern California while both the Ranked 3-year Precipitation and PDSI show that currently the drought in northern California is only on the order of the 4th or 5th driest in the past 120 years; certainly not the driest in the past 1200 years statewide.

Jan Null, CCM
Golden Gate Weather Services

Jan Null

Jan Null has been a meteorologist in the San Francisco Bay Area for almost five decades and is frequently seen on television and heard on the radio when weather is in the news. Twenty-six years ago he founded a consulting firm, Golden Gate Weather Services, after a 24-year career with the National Weather Service. Mr. Null is a Bay Area native, having grown up in Oakland and lived in the East Bay until 2006 when he moved to Saratoga. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Atmospheric Science from UC Davis in 1974 and his Master’s from San Jose State in 1992. Jan joined the National Weather Service in 1974 at the Weather Service Forecast Office in Redwood City. He worked as an operational forecaster throughout his career, including 13 years as Lead Forecaster. During his tenure at the NWS he also served as Meteorologist-in-Charge at the Center Weather Service Unit at the FAA’s Air Traffic Control Center in Fremont. He also did extensive research into the relationship between El Niño, La Niña and California rainfall and throughout his career he was a frequent media spokesperson for the agency. Jan has also been an Adjunct Professor and Lecturer at San Francisco and San Jose State Universities where he taught one evening a week for nearly 30 years. In 1998, Jan founded Golden Gate Weather Services, a consulting firm that specializes in forensic meteorology. He frequently serves as an expert witness in litigation where the weather is a factor. This often involves reconstructing past weather events or as his wife refers to it: “CSI Weather”. Mr. Null is also an internationally recognized expert of the sad topic of the heatstroke deaths of children in vehicles. After the death of a child left a vehicle in San Jose in 2001 he did a comprehensive study of vehicle temperatures that was ultimately published in Pediatrics in 2005. Since that time he has spoken at numerous national conferences and worked with a wide variety of child safety advocacy groups and agencies to raise awareness about the dozens of children who die from hyperthermia in hot vehicles each year. This data continues to be updated at NOHeatstroke.org. In his spare time he is a serious amateur photographer, specializing in wildlife and landscapes. Jan is married to Susan Hollis, a lifelong Saratoga resident and Realtor. He has two adult children in the Bay Area and the world’s most adorable 9-year old granddaughter and 4-year grandson.

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