By Kiley Bense, Bob Berwyn, Keerti Gopal, Lee Hedgepeth, Lisa Sorg

January 26, 2026

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.

Climate change is making disasters more intense and unpredictable. FEMA is less prepared than it was a year ago.

A sprawling winter storm that left hundreds of thousands without power, grounded thousands of flights and disrupted travel across the eastern half of the U.S. could be the first real test of the second Trump administration’s Federal Emergency Management Agency. 

The president has said that he wants to eliminate FEMA, and the agency has lost thousands of employees since his second term began. Emergency-management experts have braced for the moment that a weakened FEMA would face a multi-state disaster. 

“We’ve been lucky, really, over the last year,” said Alan Gerard, a retired National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration meteorologist who now writes the newsletter Balanced Weather. “We didn’t have any landfalling hurricanes. We haven’t really had a wide-ranging natural disaster-type situation in the last several months.” 

FEMA typically plays a key role in coordinating and delivering resources when an emergency hits multiple states at once. “FEMA and the whole federal infrastructure is really critical in terms of organizing big responses like this,” said Mathy Stanislaus, a former assistant administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Land & Emergency Management.

President Donald Trump has so far approved federal disaster declarations for 12 states, mostly in the South, in the wake of the storm. 

The Trump administration’s cuts to FEMA come at the same time that climate change is making large-scale weather disasters more likely and more intense, even as the president continues to question the basics of climate science. On Friday, Trump posted on social media about the storm and cold snap, asking followers, “WHATEVER HAPPENED TO GLOBAL WARMING???” 

In fact, scientists say, global warming has reshaped the atmospheric engine in ways that can make winter storms and extreme cold outbreaks more disruptive than ever.

Rapid Arctic warming and melting, stronger and more intense ocean heat waves, increased atmospheric moisture and more frequent disruptions of the stratospheric polar vortex are all factors “contributing to the extreme winter weather unfolding across the U.S. this week,” Jennifer Francis, an atmospheric scientist and senior scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center in Falmouth, Massachusetts, said via email.

More than a foot of snow fell across the U.S. from Arkansas to Massachusetts, with some places seeing nearly two feet. Ice blanketed much of the South, bringing down tree limbs and knocking out power from Texas to North Carolina. 

At least 20 people were killed during the storm, and thousands are navigating power loss, dangerous travel conditions and freezing temperatures. More than 600,000 homes and businesses were without power as of Monday afternoon. 

Emergency management experts and government officials warned that the situation is still unfolding, particularly in Southern states impacted by ice. Falls, traffic accidents, hypothermia and carbon monoxide poisoning are among the possible threats in the storm’s aftermath.

“The danger period is much higher immediately after the storm passes,” said Craig Fugate, a former FEMA administrator.

How Climate Change Reshapes Winter

Scientists agree that human-caused warming has changed the way air and energy move around the planet in complex and interrelated ways that influence outbreaks of extreme winter weather. 

The current cold wave is not happening in isolation, but in a fundamentally altered climate system. At a basic level, the oceans are warmer and the atmosphere holds more moisture than 50 or 100 years ago. Both fuel stronger storms, including nor’easters, which have intensified significantly in recent decades, according to a 2024 study. 

Nor’easters spin up along the East Coast, drag subtropical moisture from the south and pull frigid polar air from the north. Both their maximum wind speeds and hourly precipitation rates have increased since 1940, said University of Pennsylvania climate scientist Michael Mann, a co-author of the paper. 

That research, he said via email, for the first time was able to quantify the changes. He warned that “more intense storms, with greater amounts of snowfall” are to be expected, even as the planet warms.

“Stronger storms, as they spin, pull up more warm air on one side and pull more cold air down on the other side, so we see both warm and cold temperature extremes associated with them,” he said.

Along with warmer oceans and a wetter atmosphere, global warming has also reduced Arctic sea ice by nearly a third since the 1980s, which is enough to change the path of the jet stream, the wavy, fast-moving river of air that separates cold Arctic air from warmer air to the south. 

Extreme cold events are usually linked to big north-south bends in that flow, said Francis, the Woodwell Climate Research Center scientist, who is known for her research on rapid Arctic warming and its influence on mid-latitude weather patterns. 

Right now, the jet stream is bulging far north over the western U.S. while plunging deep south over the east, allowing Arctic air to spill unusually far south. The pattern is becoming more common as the Arctic warms faster than the rest of the planet, weakening the temperature contrast that normally keeps the jet stream straighter and faster.

“Big waves like this are more common when the Arctic is unusually warm, and it’s near record-warm right now,” she said. The pattern has been common this winter and likely is linked with a strong and persistent ocean heat wave in the North Pacific, she added.

An ocean heat wave in that area bulges the jet stream north over the West, causing a southward dip downstream, over the central and Eastern U.S., followed by another northward bulge that brought extreme warmth to Greenland.

Adding complexity is the fact that Arctic warming is uneven, said atmospheric scientist Judah Cohen, director of seasonal forecasting at Atmospheric and Environmental Research and a visiting scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Parsons Laboratory. He’s known for his work on how Arctic variability influences winter weather and the polar vortex, a pool of frigid air usually locked high over the Arctic. 

Especially intense heating north of Scandinavia ripples the atmosphere in a way that disrupts the polar vortex. When the ripples caused by uneven warming turn into larger waves, they reach the high-altitude polar vortex and distend it, like a soft water balloon. 

In that stretched position, Cohen said, the polar vortex pulls extremely cold air from Siberia across the Arctic and into the central and eastern U.S. Because the air travels quickly, it has little time to warm, increasing the likelihood of severe and long-lasting cold outbreaks. 

Meanwhile, some areas of the U.S. that rely on snow are increasingly out of luck. While the East shivers, much of the West has been gripped by warm and dry conditions for weeks, with winter snowpack—critical for summer stream flows—near record low in many areas.

A Deep Freeze in the Deep South

Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee were among the states hardest hit during the storm, with more than half a million customers still without power as of Monday morning. Utility companies in Tennessee described “catastrophic damage,” and in Mississippi, one company warned it could be weeks before power was fully restored.

That grim news comes as the region faces extremely low temperatures tonight. These conditions could be dire for some people if they are trapped without power in their homes for an extended period of time.

In Louisiana, at least two people died due to hypothermia in Caddo Parish, according to the state’s Department of Health. The Tennessee Emergency Management Agency confirmed three deaths related to weather conditions in Crockett, Haywood and Obion counties near Memphis.

The mayor of Oxford, Mississippi, Robyn Tannehill, said in an interview with meteorologist Matt Laubhan that the damage in her town was “extensive.” 

“It looks like there’s been a tornado on every street in Oxford,” she said. “Trees on houses, trees on cars, trees blocking roadways, trees that have pulled whole power lines down and power poles that have snapped. It is an emergency situation right now.”

Fangs of ice hung from trees and power lines in Tennessee, where Gov. Bill Lee told residents in an online briefing Sunday that the storm was “unusually dangerous in many ways.”

Freezing rain, strong winds and temperatures in the lower single digits “can hamper our ability to respond” amid widespread power outages, said Patrick Sheehan, director of the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency.

“It looks like there’s been a tornado on every street.”— Robyn Tannehill, mayor of Oxford, Mississippi

Residents in Adamsville, Tennessee, located near the Mississippi border, lost access to running water and won’t get it back until power is restored. 

In North Carolina, some of the worst impacts of the storm occurred in the western mountains, which are still recovering from damage Hurricane Helene inflicted in September 2024.

“We are concerned about the double-whammy impact,” Gov. Josh Stein said during an online briefing Saturday. “Any future trees falling will add more fuel on the ground once we get into wildfire season.”

In Mississippi, Gov. Tate Reeves said on Sunday that the situation in the state would get worse before it got better as ice on trees and power lines continued to cause power outages in gusting winds.Reeves said the state was coordinating with FEMA to bring in additional generators and supplies for warming centers, such as cots, water and blankets.

Some people may have difficulty getting to those warming centers. Road travel continues to be impacted across the South, where temperatures are expected to remain at or below freezing throughout Monday.

“As the governor said, we can sum up our road conditions and road travel with one word, and that is, ‘nope,’” said Brad White, the executive director of the Mississippi Department of Transportation. “We would love to see y’all but not zigzagging across three lanes of traffic at 40 miles per hour.”

In Alabama, 27-year-old Morgan Lakesha Hawkins of Birmingham was killed and another person was seriously injured after their vehicle struck a guardrail in nearby Mountain Brook. 

The danger for people in the South is not over, especially for those without power. “An extremely cold night is forecast tonight with low temperatures in the single digits,” said Gerard, the meteorologist. “This level of cold is highly unusual, and buildings are not generally built for [it]. The danger of hypothermia and infrastructure damage to things like water pipes and mains is significant.”

“Torturous” Cold in Chicago

The Arctic air brought Chicago its lowest recorded wind chill since 2019, at 36 degrees below zero on Friday, according to the National Weather Service’s local office. Chicago Public Schools closed that day, with the city on an extreme cold watch then and throughout the weekend. NWS warned that just 10 minutes outside could result in frostbite on exposed skin. 

Extreme cold poses other serious health hazards, including hypothermia and the exacerbation of chronic conditions. From Thursday through Monday afternoon, 339 patients were seen for cold-exposure injuries at Chicago emergency departments, according to the city’s Department of Public Health. 

The number on Saturday alone, 119, was almost four times more than the city expected. Nearly half of the patients were Black, which speaks to the unequal impact of weather hazards.

Cold-related health hazards are most acute for the elderly and those without access to consistent shelter. Rev. Shawna Bowman, executive director of Friendship Community Place, a neighborhood hub in Jefferson Park on the city’s Northwest Side, coordinated with volunteers to keep the space open as a warming center over the weekend and helped unhoused residents find safe places to spend the night. 

Bowman said it can be challenging for residents to know what resources are available and to travel to warming centers not in their neighborhood. The Northwest Side has “a real dearth of resources,” they added, and mutual-aid efforts like theirs are working to fill in the gaps.

Early Saturday evening, the community-run center had a handful of visitors, some eating instant ramen to warm up from the cold.

Ivon Ivans sat on a sofa near the entrance, preparing to go to a nearby church with her boyfriend, Miguel Martinez, for the night. Ivans has been homeless for three years and is on the waitlist for housing through the Chicago Housing Authority, she said. Martinez said he has been unhoused for about 20 years. 

Ivans said she has several chronic health conditions that are exacerbated by the cold, including cirrhosis of the liver and anemia. Martinez has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease that flares up in the winter, making it harder for him to breathe. 

“It’s torturous,” Ivans said of the weather. 

Across the street from the community center, five people were taking refuge for the night at a police station—all of which are open 24 hours for shelter from the cold. 

Yvette Hausman and her fiancé, Nathan Watkins, who are both unhoused, sat on the floor of the station with blankets and some belongings. Hausman said she didn’t know the cold was coming, but that she was grateful for community members who mobilized quickly to provide and spread the word about impromptu warming resources.

“There has been a lot of warming centers that have popped up randomly,” Hausman said. “You just see the community come together.”

“The First Boots on the Ground”

It’s not yet clear how turmoil at FEMA under the Trump administration could be impacting response and recovery for the storm, but experts are concerned that delays in the allocation of funding, leadership upheaval and staffing cuts mean that the agency’s ability to function effectively during and after an emergency has been seriously constrained. FEMA did not respond to multiple requests for comment. 

“Certainly the dysfunction at FEMA over the past year is affecting any response that happens across the country,” said Samantha Montano, an associate professor of emergency management at Massachusetts Maritime Academy and the author of the book “Disasterology: Dispatches from the Frontlines of the Climate Crisis.”

The Trump administration laid off or forced out more than 2,000 FEMA employees in 2025 and had planned to end the contracts for thousands more this year until Thursday, when the agency paused that effort amid preparation for the winter storm. More than 300 CORE, or Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employees, had already been let go by that point. 

CORE workers are critical at FEMA, said Michael Coen, a former chief of staff at the agency. “These employees are usually the first boots on the ground,” he said.

The agency has struggled with leadership turnover and the departure of experienced senior staff; FEMA has cycled through three directors in the past year. The agency’s current leader, Karen Evans, lacks relevant experience, Coen said. 

Montano said rural parts of the country affected by a storm like this one typically need federal help more than urban areas. In places with smaller emergency management departments and fewer resources, “that extra support from the federal government is even more important,” she said.

Coen said he thought FEMA had done well so far coordinating with the states affected by the storm. “Hopefully the current Trump administration saw value in how FEMA coordinated and convened a meeting with 21 governors to talk about a national effort to ensure preparedness and how they would all respond together,” he said. Coen praised career staff at FEMA who have handled the response. 

But he’s worried about future disasters. The effects of climate change mean that the next large-scale weather event may not be far behind this one. The agency has not said whether it will resume contract non-renewals after this storm has passed. 

“FEMA is supposed to be ready for no-notice events. The current political leadership isn’t taking that into account, and they just react to storms as they happen,” Coen said. “For someone like me who has had a career in emergency management, that’s very troubling.”

Click on a thumbnail graphic to view a gallery of drought data from the US Drought Monitor website:

Click the link to go to the US Drought Monitor website. Here’s an excerpt:

This Week’s Drought Summary

Most precipitation across the contiguous United States fell in association with a large, impactful storm system that affected a broad area from the southernmost Rockies and the southern Plains eastward across a large part of the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys, the Southeast, and the Eastern Seaboard. Winter storm warnings at one point covered about one million square miles. Heavy to excessive amounts of snow, sleet, and freezing rain were widespread throughout the region. Numerous locations across Pennsylvania, New York, and New England recorded 1 to 2 feet of snow or snow and sleet. Elsewhere, totals reached as high as 17 inches in Ohio and West Virginia; 15 inches in Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana; and 1 foot in Arkansas, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware. Intense sleet fell farther south, overlapping the southern sections of the heavy snow area. Sleet totals topped out near 7 inches in Arkansas, Louisiana, and North Carolina; near or slightly over 6 inches fell on scattered sites across Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Maryland; and localized amounts reached 4 inches in Texas, South Carolina, North Carolina, West Virginia, and Virginia. Freezing rain fell in abundance across portions of the South, and in some areas that experienced a changeover from sleet. States with at least one site reporting 1 inch thick ice accumulation included Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina while peak amounts of 0.7 to 0.8 inch were reported in Texas, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Virginia, and West Virginia. Widespread power outages and tree damage was reported in many locations that received heavy freezing rain. Liquid-equivalent precipitation totals associated with this system exceeded an inch in parts of the southernmost Rockies, in a band from eastern Texas and western Arkansas eastward through Alabama, most of Tennessee and Kentucky, the central and northern Virginias, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and in scattered locations across adjacent areas, including the Northeast. Scattered areas across the southern tier of the Lower-48 recorded over 3 inches of precipitation, including central Texas, southern Louisiana and adjacent Texas, and a fairly solid band from northeastern Texas through northern Louisiana, northern Mississippi, and northwestern Alabama. Up to 10 inches fell on one patch in southwestern Louisiana, and localized amounts exceeded 4 inches in northern Mississippi and a few other scattered areas.

However, despite the extensive coverage of impactful precipitation, the storm has not yet brought about broad areas of drought relief. Improvements were made where some of the heaviest liquid-equivalent precipitation fell, including a few places where it fell in frozen form. However, Arctic air has settled into the eastern states in the wake of the storm, and in many if not most areas, the water that could eventually help ease drought conditions was locked up in accumulated frozen precipitation, and can’t provide tangible improvements to drought impacts until it has melted. In the South, this may be only a matter of a few days, and relief was depicted more quickly there than farther north, especially in the northern tier of the East where temperatures may remain below freezing for extended periods of time.

Along the northwestern and southeastern edges of the winter storm, light to moderate precipitation was recorded, with totals ranging from a few tenths to nearly an inch over the western half of Texas and from much of Oklahoma northeastward through most of Missouri, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and the upper reaches of the Northeast. Similar amounts were noted to the south of the heaviest precipitation, generally across portions of the Carolinas, southeastern Georgia, Florida, and the immediate central Gulf Coast.

In other parts of the Lower-48, very little if any precipitation was recorded. The single widespread and extremely impactful winter storm was responsible for almost all of the precipitation observed this week…

High Plains

Most of the High Plains Region was dry last week, with an amounts of a few tenths to approaching one inch fell on much of central and eastern Kansas and on scattered higher elevations in Colorado and Wyoming. Otherwise, little or nothing fell. The Region – outside the higher elevations – is climatologically cold and dry, so precipitation deficits increase very slowly, and demand is lower this time of year. Dryness and drought was essentially unchanged in most of the High Plains Region, with some scattered deterioration introduced in parts of western Colorado (to D1 or D2). Drought intensification was also introduced around the Black Hills and adjacent western South Dakota (to D0 or D1), where snowpack is deficient and slowly declining…

West

The southern fringe of the West Region was impacted by the western edge of the winter storm, resulting in over 1.5 inches of precipitation across a few patches from southeastern Arizona across southern New Mexico. Amounts exceeded 3 inches in parts of south-central New Mexico north of the Texas Big Bend. The precipitation fell mostly in liquid form in southeastern Arizona, and was sufficient to bring improvements into that area. Farther east, although amounts were a little heavier, the precipitation was primarily in frozen form, and remained unmelted. Therefore, only a few targeted improvements were introduced in a few small areas reporting the highest precipitation amounts (over 3 inches). Elsewhere, most of the Region received no measurable precipitation, with just a few tenths falling on some of the higher elevations of the Rockies. Still, there was no tangible deterioration across the Region during the dry week, in part because it followed a few weeks of relatively abundant precipitation. As a result, the Drought Monitor depiction was unchanged outside parts of the southern fringes of Arizona and New Mexico…

South

One to several inches of precipitation was widespread across most of Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, central and southern Arkansas, the eastern Texas. Improvements were introduced in a number of areas, generally the areas that received the most precipitation, where much of the precipitation fell in liquid form, or where drought was already waning. To wit, some relatively broad improvements were introduced in Tennessee and to a lesser extent Mississippi. Farther west, where subnormal precipitation dates back at least several months, improvements were more targeted to the areas receiving the heaviest precipitation, especially from central Louisiana northward where precipitation remained unmelted. Despite the precipitation accompanying the massive winter storm, Many areas in a band from northern Arkansas to the Louisiana Gulf Coast recorded 8 to 10 inches less than normal precipitation over the past 90 days, with a few spots in northeastern Arkansas and east-central Louisiana recording deficits approaching 12 inches during this period. Farther west, moderate to heavy precipitation was fairly widespread in eastern Texas, with lesser amounts toward the central part of the state. Southeastern Oklahoma reported amounts similar to eastern Texas (1.5 to locally 3.0 inches), but most areas farther northwest recorded less than an inch. With much of the precipitation remaining locked up in frozen form, only a few surgical improvements were introduced in the areas with the most extreme totals in eastern Texas. A few inches of liquid-equivalent precipitation also fell farther southwest over south-central Texas. Temperatures were above freezing there at the end of the period, and the environment was beginning to respond to the moisture infusion, so somewhat more aggressive improvements were introduced there…

Click the link to read the article on the Sky-Hi News website (Ali Longwell):

January 25, 2026

During a Jan. 22 Water Conditions Monitoring Committee, Brian Domonkos, the Colorado snow survey supervisor for the U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service, reported that the best snowpack conditions in Colorado, in the Rio Grande basin, still rank as the fourth worst in the last 40 years on record.  Statewide snowpack and snowpack in the Colorado River Headwaters basin are both at record lows for the period on record, Domonkos reported.

“At this point in the year, we are 51% of the way through the winter or the snowpack accumulation season,” Domonkos said. “There’s a very, very small chance that we could get back to normal at this point.”

“We have 4.8 inches of water content on average across all of our snow measuring sites in Colorado,” Domonkos said. “Typically, at this point in the year, we have about 8.5 inches of water content (in the snowpack).” 

While it’s a bit early to look at predictions for the spring runoff, “it’s very likely that we’ll wind up seeing below normal runoff projections this year,” Domonkos said. 

For Colorado to end the winter with a normal amount of snowpack, the state “needs about 145% of normal snow accumulation,” he said, adding that this is “close to needing the maximum amount of snow accumulation that we’ve ever seen in the last 40 years in order to get back to normal.” 

Click the link to read the article on The Denver Post website (John Aquilar and John Meyer). Here’s an excerpt:

July 25, 2026

The warm, snow-free weather that many in the city have enjoyed for weeks — extending the active season for cyclists, hikers and runners — is bringing less joy to the high country, where the nearly $5 billion-a-year Colorado ski industry is struggling to salvage its season…Colorado just clocked its warmest December since records started being kept in 1895, while Denver had its second-warmest final month of the year. The city broke daily temperature records seven times last month, including on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. It also documented 21 days where the average temperature was more than 6 degrees above normal, according to the National Weather Service. The balmy days have extended into 2026, with Jan. 4 setting a new high-temperature recordof 67 degrees for metro Denver for that date.

“What makes this year so unusual is it’s been so warm for so long,” said [Russ] Schumacher, who is also a professor in the Department of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University…

The reasons behind the rise in temperatures and the increase in dryness are fiercely debated, with a mix of focus on the impacts coming from global climate change and those that are attributable to the weather variability that has long shaped what is experienced on the ground. Globally, the 10 warmest years on record have occurred in the last decade, according to the World Meteorological Organization. The same group determined that the global average concentration of carbon dioxide in 2024 surged to the highest level since modern measurements began in 1957…According to a series of scientific studies published last year and collated by the Yale Center for Environmental Communication, researchers determined that climate change is complicit in the drying and warming of the American Southwest. The studies found emissions from the burning of fossil fuels are driving an ongoing 25-year shortfall in winter rains and mountain snows across the region. Dryness has accompanied the elevated temperatures felt by Coloradans this fall and winter, with the state tallying its 34th-driest December in 130 years of record-keeping, according to the Colorado Climate Center. Much of the state is in some level of drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, though a broad swath of the Eastern Plains is not. Denver had its second-latest first accumulating snow — on Nov. 29. As of Thursday, mountain snowpack was at 56% of the median for that date, according to data collected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Water and Climate Center. The snowpack was well below the lowest level recorded at this point in the season in records that go back to 1987…

Jason Ullmann, the state engineer for the Colorado Division of Water Resources, said that despite the recent dry conditions, water storage levels across the state were in pretty good shape.

“We’re in an OK position with reservoir storage on average statewide,” he said.

But Ullmann noted that if things didn’t ramp up significantly on the storm front over the next two months or so, a different conversation could be in the offing by spring.

“It’s not time for panic — there is time for it to improve,” he said. “One of our snowiest months, March, is still to come.”

I’m having trouble accessing the SNOTEL basin-filled maps this morning and also the Yampa-White-Little Snake and State of Colorado SWE Interactive graph. I will try to update this post if things clear up in time. (Technology is great when it works!)

Click on a thumbnail graphic to view a gallery of drought data from the US Drought Monitor website.

Click the link to go to the US Drought Monitor website. Here’s an excerpt:

This Week’s Drought Summary

The Lower 48 States finally settled into a more tranquil weather pattern, as a ridge of high pressure settled across the West and a deep trough developed over the East. With many parts of the western U.S. reporting below-average snowpack for this time of year, the pattern change led to increasing concerns regarding Western water supply for next summer and beyond, despite robust precipitation in many areas during the first half of the winter wet season. Still, hydrologic signals were mixed, with California’s 154 primary intrastate reservoirs containing 25.9 million acre-feet of water (123% of the historic average) as 2026 began. Meanwhile, storage in the sprawling, multi-state Colorado River Basin stood at just under 17.3 million acre-feet (53% of average), reflecting long-term issues in part related to chronically elevated temperatures and a multi-decadal Southwestern drought. Farther east, the Plains served as the transition zone between mild, dry weather in the West and increasingly cold conditions in the East. The Plains’ experienced dry weather, aside from wind-driven snow showers on the northern Plains, as well as an occasionally elevated wildfire threat. Elsewhere, areas from the Mississippi Valley eastward noted cold weather, accompanied by occasional rain and snow showers. Some of the heaviest snow fell the Great Lakes States, especially in squall-prone locations. Snow also fell along and near the Atlantic Seaboard, mainly on January 17-18. As colder air became more entrenched in the Midwest and East, drought changes that had been occurring quickly in recent weeks, either due to flash drought or active winter storms, became more muted, with drought effectively “frozen in place” by chilly, mostly dry conditions. During the second half of the drought-monitoring period, sub-0°F temperatures were commonly observed across the upper Midwest and neighboring regions…

High Plains

Patchy expansion of dryness and drought was noted, mainly across Nebraska, Wyoming, and southern South Dakota. Due to periods of warm, windy weather, Nebraska reported that statewide topsoil moisture was rated 68% very short to short in early January, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Similarly, Wyoming’s topsoil moisture was rated 55% very short to short…

West

Over the last couple of weeks, an uncomfortable silence has settled across the West. With snowpack already below average in many Western watersheds due to this winter’s preponderance of “warm” storm systems, the mid-point of the region’s snow-accumulation season has arrived with snow-water equivalencies falling farther behind normal each day. Among Western basins, only those located in the northern Rockies and neighboring areas are reporting widespread near-normal snowpack. By January 20, snow-water equivalencies were broadly less than 50% of average in Oregon (and portions of adjacent states) and the Southwest. Although many areas of the West are reporting above-average season-to-date precipitation, the anomalous winter warmth and corresponding lack of snow could have serious future implications for wildfire activity and summer water supplies. For now, however, more than half of the 11-state Western region—including all of California—is free of drought…

South

Worsening drought was a common theme, especially from eastern Texas into Arkansas. A small area of exceptional drought (D4) was introduced in northern Arkansas, amid a punishing period of drought that has left pastures in extremely poor condition and has left many individuals with limited surface water supplies from ponds and streams. Several weeks ago, in early January, the U.S. Department of Agriculture categorized Arkansas’ topsoil moisture as 46% very short to short—and mostly dry weather has prevailed since that report was compiled. From northern Arkansas, a continuous area of severe to extreme drought (D2 to D3) extended southwestward into northeastern Texas. Patchy D2 stretched into neighboring states, including Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. Much of southern Texas, as well as southern, central, and eastern Oklahoma is experiencing moderate to extreme drought (D1 to D3)…

Looking Ahead

From January 23-26, an expansive and potentially dangerous winter storm will unfold from southern sections of the Rockies and Plains to the middle and southern Atlantic States, excluding areas along and near the Gulf Coast. Much of the South will face multiple weather hazards, including wintry precipitation (snow, sleet, or freezing rain), gusty winds, and unusually low temperatures. Wintry weather may extend at least as far south as central Texas and northern sections of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. Post-storm temperatures should fall to 10°F or below along and north of a line from central Texas to northern Georgia, with particular concern for areas that lose electricity due to downed power lines from accumulations of ice and snow. Farther north, sub-0°F readings will be common as far south as the central Plains and the Ohio Valley. The storm is likely to have serious agricultural impacts, including significant stress on livestock due to exposure to cold, wind, wintry precipitation, or a combination of weather extremes. Temperatures could briefly plunge to -30°F or below from North Dakota into the upper Great Lakes region.

The NWS 6- to 10-day outlook for January 27 – 31 calls for the likelihood of below-normal temperatures throughout the eastern half of the U.S., while warmer-than-normal weather will prevail in the West. Meanwhile, near- or below-normal precipitation nearly nationwide should contrast with wetter-than-normal conditions in a few areas, including southern Florida and southern and coastal Texas.

January 2026

Click the link to access the report on the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health website (Madani K., Mir Matin, Aria Farsi, Luying Wang, Amir AghaKouchak, Mohammed Azhar, Jenna Elshurafa, Sogol Jafarzadeh, Tafadzwanashe Mabhaudhi, Ali Mirchi, Abraham Nunbogu, Mojtaba Sadegh, Robert Sandford, Manoochehr Shirzaei, William Smyth, Hossein Tabari, MJ Tourian, Farshid Vahedifard).

Global water bankruptcy in brief

• The planet has entered the Global Water Bankruptcy era. In many basins and aquifers, long-term water use has exceeded renewable inflows and safe depletion limits, and parts of the water and natural capital—rivers, lakes, aquifers, wetlands, soils, and glaciers—have been damaged beyond realistic prospects of full recovery.
• Billions remain water insecure. Nearly three-quarters of the world’s population lives in countries classified as water-insecure or critically water-insecure. Around 2.2 billion people still lack safely managed drinking water, 3.5 billion lack safely managed sanitation, and about 4 billion experience severe water scarcity for at least one month a year.
• Surface waters are shrinking at scale. A growing number of major rivers now fail to reach the sea or fall below environmental flow needs for significant parts of the year. More than half of the world’s large lakes have lost water since the early 1990s, affecting around one-quarter of the global population that depends directly on them for water security.
• Wetlands have been liquidated on a continental scale. Over the past five decades, the world has lost roughly 410 million hectares of natural wetlands—almost the land area of the European Union—including an estimated 177 million hectares of inland marshes and swamps, roughly the size of Libya or seven times the area of the United Kingdom. The loss of ecosystem services from these wetlands is valued at over US$5.1 trillion, roughly equivalent to the combined annual GDP of about 135 of the world’s poorest countries.
• Groundwater depletion and land subsidence are widespread and often irreversible. Groundwater now provides about 50% of global domestic water use and over 40% of irrigation water, tying both drinking water security and food production directly to rapidly depleting aquifers. Around 70% of the world’s major aquifers show long-term declining trends.
• Excessive groundwater extraction has already contributed to significant land subsidence over more than 6 million square kilometers—almost 5% of the global land area—including over 200,000 square kilometers of urban and densely populated zones where close to 2 billion people live. In some locations, land is sinking by up to 25 centimeters per year, permanently reducing storage capacity and increasing flood risk.
• Cryosphere loss is liquidating critical “water savings”. The world, in multiple locations, has already lost more than 30% of its glacier mass since 1970. Several low- and mid-latitude mountain ranges risk losing functional glaciers within decades, undermining the long-term security of hundreds of millions of people who rely on glacier- and snowmelt-fed rivers for drinking water, irrigation, and hydropower.
• Agricultural heartlands are running down their water capital. Roughly 70% of global freshwater withdrawals are used for agriculture. Around 3 billion people and more than half of the world’s food production are located.
• in areas where total water storage—including surface water, soil moisture, snow, ice, and groundwater—is already declining or unstable. More than 170 million hectares of irrigated cropland—roughly the combined land area of France, Spain, Germany and Italy—are under high or very high water stress.
• Land and soil degradation are amplifying water-related risks. More than half of global agricultural land is now moderately or severely degraded, reducing soil moisture retention and pushing drylands toward desertification. Salinization alone has degraded roughly 82 million hectares of rainfed cropland and 24 million hectares of irrigated cropland—together more than 100 million hectares of cropland—eroding yields in some of the world’s key breadbaskets.
• Drought is increasingly anthropogenic and extremely costly. Over 1.8 billion people were living under drought conditions in 2022–2023. Drought-related damages, intensified by land degradation, groundwater depletion and climate change rather than rainfall deficits alone, already amount to about US$307 billion per year worldwide—larger than the annual GDP of almost three-quarters of UN Member States.
• Water quality degradation is shrinking the truly usable resource base. In many basins, pollution from untreated or inadequately treated wastewater, agricultural runoff, industrial and mining effluents, and salinization means that a growing share of water is no longer safe or economically viable for drinking, food production or ecosystems—even where nominal volumes have not yet declined dramatically.
• The planetary freshwater boundary has been transgressed. Global evidence shows that two important elements of the freshwater cycle—“blue water” (surface and groundwater) and “green water” (soil moisture)—have been pushed beyond a safe operating space, alongside planetary boundaries for climate, biosphere integrity, and land systems.
• Existing governance and agendas are no longer fit for purpose. In many basins, the sum of legal water rights, informal expectations and development promises far exceeds degraded hydrological carrying capacity in the absence of effective governance institutions to address water bankruptcy. The current global agenda focused primarily on WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene), incremental efficiency gains and generic IWRM (Integrated Water Resources Management) prescriptions is insufficient to address structural overshoot, irreversibility and the rising risks of social instability and conflict associated with water bankruptcy.

Executive Summary

Water is the quiet infrastructure of everything the United Nations cares about: human security and prosperity, food and energy security, biodiversity, environmental resilience, public health, climate stability, and peace. The UN Sustainable

Development Goal 6 (SDG 6) captures this centrality by committing the world to ensuring the availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all. Yet, the world is still very far from meeting SDG 6. About 2.2 billion people still lack safely managed drinking water, 3.5 billion lack safely managed sanitation, and about 4 billion people experience severe water scarcity for at least one month per year. Nearly 75% of the world’s population lives in countries classified as water-insecure or critically water-insecure with progress toward SDG 6 is far off track for 2030. These figures indicate that water-related risks are now systemic rather than marginal.

For decades, the global policy and science communities have warned of an escalating “water crisis” and called for accelerated action to avert it. Those warnings were not wrong, but they are now incomplete. The language of crisis—suggesting a temporary emergency followed by a return to normal through mitigation efforts—no longer captures what is happening in many parts of the world. This report by the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH) on the 30th anniversary of its inception responds to this gap by offering a new, more precise diagnosis and recommendations for a new governance agenda fitting the water realities of the Anthropocene in the 21st century. The report is a wake-up call and an open invitation to the policy community to use water as a powerful bridge to promote cooperation to address some of the most critical security, peace, justice, development, and sustainability challenges of our time.

The central message of this report is direct: the world has entered the era of Global Water Bankruptcy. In many regions, human–water systems are already in a post-crisis state of failure. Over decades, societies have withdrawn more water than climate and hydrology can reliably provide, drawing down not only the annual “income” of renewable flows but also the “savings” stored in aquifers, glaciers, soils, wetlands, and river ecosystems. At the same time, pollution, salinization, and other forms of water quality degradation have reduced the fraction of water that is safely usable.

The consequences of water bankruptcy are now visible on every continent: rivers that no longer reach the sea; lakes, wetlands, and glaciers that have shrunk or disappeared; aquifers pumped down until land subsides and salt intrudes; forests and peatlands drying and burning; deserts and dust storms expanding, and cities repeatedly brought to the brink of “Day Zero.” These are not simply signs of stress or episodes of crisis. They are symptoms of systems that have overspent their hydrological budget and eroded the natural capital that once made recovery possible, with knock-on effects for food prices, employment, migration and geopolitical stability.

The report calls for the recognition of the state of ‘Water bankruptcy’ as a persistent post-crisis condition of a human–water system in which long-term water use has exceeded renewable inflows and safe depletion limits, causing irreversible or effectively irreversible degradation such that previous levels of water supply and ecosystem functions cannot realistically be restored. In a bankruptcy state, some damages are physically irreparable on human time scales: compacted aquifers do not rebound, subsided deltas do not rise, extinct species do not return, and lost lakes cannot be restored within planning horizons. Others are technically reversible only at costs so high, or over periods so long, that they are effectively irreversible for policy and planning purposes. This is what distinguishes water bankruptcy from two better-known states: water stress, where high pressure still allows recovery, and water crisis, where an acute, time-bound shock can in principle be overcome.

Water bankruptcy is not only about the ‘insolvency’ of the system but also about its ‘irreversibility’. The shift from crisis to bankruptcy has profound implications for how the world approaches both mitigation and adaptation. Crisis management is essentially restorative: it aims to survive a shock and get back to the previous normal, often through mitigation efforts, short-term emergency measures, and supply-side fixes. Bankruptcy management is different. In finance, declaring bankruptcy is the precondition for a fresh, more sustainable start: debts are recognized, claims are written down, and a new balance sheet is constructed to prevent further collapse. In the same way, managing water bankruptcy calls for a transformational fresh start in human–water relations. It demands a deliberate combination of efforts for mitigation plus adaptation to new hydrological and environmental normals.

Bankruptcy management acknowledges the failure of the current development system and water management model and irreversibility of some damages, while recognizing the urgency of preventing additional damages through transformative reforms. Mitigation attempts seek not only to restore the lost past but also to avoid pushing more basins into bankruptcy and to slow the erosion of remaining water-related natural capital. In the meantime, adaptation efforts are focused on functioning more efficiently within tighter hydrologic incremental efficiency gains and generic IWRM limits through reconfigured economics, governance prescriptions—is no longer fit for purpose in the institutions, and development models, while Anthropocene or for an era of growing geopolitical recognizing non-stationary climatic and changed tensions and stalled multilateral processes. It environmental conditions.

The report reframes the water governance for achieving the goals of the Rio Conventions challenge for a post-crisis era. Rather than asking and the 2030 Agenda, aligning local and national only how to avoid a future water crisis, it asks what it priorities with global climate, biodiversity and means to govern human–water systems on a water-land commitments, and offering common ground bankrupt planet: how to admit insolvency where it between the Global North and Global South as exists; how to manage irreversibility honestly; how well as between rural and urban, left and right to share unavoidable losses fairly; and how to design constituencies. It proposes that water be used as institutions, development pathways, and financial a bridge between fragmented policy arenas and frameworks that prevent further overspending of a divided world, helping to re-energize stalled hydrological capital and damage to the underlying negotiations on the triple planetary crisis. The natural capital.

The report emphasizes that water bankruptcy is also “Water for Sustainable Development” in 2028, a justice, security and political economy challenge. and the 2030 deadline for SDG 6 are identified as Water bankruptcy management must therefore critical milestones for embedding water-bankruptcy be explicitly equity-oriented: securing basic diagnostics, monitoring frameworks and just-human needs and critical services; safeguarding transition support into global governance. environmental flows; providing compensation and social protection where livelihoods must change; and strengthening grievance and conflict resolution mechanisms at local, national, and transboundary levels. Without this justice lens, necessary reforms risk fueling social unrest and undermining the political viability of transitions.

Finally, the report situates Global Water Bankruptcy within the wider multilateral landscape and the realities of a fragmented world. It argues that the current global water agenda—focused primarily on safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), incremental efficiency gains and generic IWRM limits through reconfigured economics, governance prescriptions—is no longer fit for purpose in the institutions, and development models, while Anthropocene or for an era of growing geopolitical recognizing non-stationary climatic and changed tensions and stalled multilateral processes. It environmental conditions. calls for a new water agenda that recognizes water as both a constraint and an opportunity sector The report reframes the water governance for achieving the goals of the Rio Conventions challenge for a post-crisis era. Rather than asking and the 2030 Agenda, aligning local and national only how to avoid a future water crisis, it asks what it priorities with global climate, biodiversity and means to govern human–water systems on a water-land commitments, and offering common ground bankrupt planet: how to admit insolvency where it between the Global North and Global South as exists; how to manage irreversibility honestly; how well as between rural and urban, left and right to share unavoidable losses fairly; and how to design constituencies. It proposes that water be used as institutions, development pathways, and financial a bridge between fragmented policy arenas and frameworks that prevent further overspending of a divided world, helping to re-energize stalled hydrological capital and damage to the underlying negotiations on the triple planetary crisis. The natural capital. upcoming UN Water Conferences in 2026 and 2028, the conclusion of the International Decade for Action The report emphasizes that water bankruptcy is also “Water for Sustainable Development” in 2028, a justice, security and political economy challenge. and the 2030 deadline for SDG 6 are identified as Water bankruptcy management must therefore critical milestones for embedding water-bankruptcy be explicitly equity-oriented: securing basic diagnostics, monitoring frameworks and just-transition support into global governance.

This UNU-INWEH report is not another warning about a crisis that might arrive in the future. It is a declaration that the world is already living beyond its hydrological means and that many human–water systems are operating in a state of water bankruptcy. Recognizing this post-crisis reality is not an act of resignation; it is the starting point for a more honest, science-based and justice-oriented agenda that uses mitigation and adaptation to build a fresh, more sustainable balance between societies and the water on which they depend—before the remaining natural capital is lost.

Key Policy Messages

• The world is already in the state of “water bankruptcy”. In many basins and aquifers, long-term overuse and degradation mean that past hydrological and ecological baselines cannot realistically be restored. While not every basin or country is water-bankrupt, enough critical systems around the world have crossed these thresholds—and are interconnected through trade, migration, climate feedbacks, and geopolitical dependencies—that the global risk landscape is now fundamentally altered.
• The familiar language of “water stress” and “water crisis” is no longer adequate. Stress describes high pressure that is still reversible; crisis describes acute, time-bound shocks. Water bankruptcy must be recognized as a distinct post-crisis state, where accumulated damage and overshoot have undermined the system’s capacity to recover.
• Water bankruptcy management must address insolvency and irreversibility. Unlike financial bankruptcy management, which deals only with insolvency, managing water bankruptcy is concerned with rebalancing demand and supply under conditions where returning to baseline conditions is no longer possible.
• Anthropogenic drought is central to the world’s new water reality. Drought and water shortage are increasingly driven by human activities—over-allocation, groundwater depletion, land and soil degradation, deforestation, pollution, and climate change—rather than natural variability alone. Water bankruptcy is the outcome of long-term anthropogenic drought, not just bad luck with hydrological anomalies. Water bankruptcy is about both quantity and quality. Declining stocks, polluted rivers, and degrading aquifers, and salinized soils mean that the truly usable fraction of available water is shrinking, even where total volumes may appear stable.
• Managing water bankruptcy requires a shift from crisis management to bankruptcy management. The priority is no longer to “get back to normal”, but to prevent further irreversible damage, rebalance rights and claims within degraded carrying capacities, transform water-intensive sectors and development models, and support just transitions for those most affected.
• Governance institutions must protect both water and its underlying natural capital. The existing institutions focus on protecting water as a good or service disregarding the natural capital that makes water available in the first place. Efforts to protect a product are ineffective when the processes that produce it are disrupted. Recognizing water bankruptcy calls for developing legal and governance institutions that can effectively protect not only water but also the hydrological cycle and natural capital that make its production possible.
• Water bankruptcy is a justice and security issue. The costs of overshoot and irreversibility fall disproportionately on smallholder farmers, rural and Indigenous communities, informal urban residents, women, youth, and downstream users, while benefits have often accrued to more powerful actors. How societies manage water bankruptcy will shape social cohesion, political stability, and peace.
• Water bankruptcy management combines mitigation with adaptation. While water crisis management paradigms seek to return the system to normal conditions through mitigation efforts only, water bankruptcy management focuses on restoring what is possible and preventing further damages through mitigation combined with adaptation to new normals and constraints.
• The world has an untapped, strategic opportunity to capitalize on water as a powerful bridge in a fragmented world. Water can align national priorities with international priorities and improve cooperation between and within nations. Roughly 70% of global freshwater withdrawals are used for agriculture, much of it by farmers in the Global South. Elevating water in global policy debates can help rebuild trust not only between the Global South and Global North, but also within countries—bridging rural and urban communities and easing polarization across left and right constituencies.
• Water must be recognized as an upstream sector. Most national and international policy agendas treat water as a downstream impact sector where investments are focused on mitigating the imposed problems and externalities. The world must recognize water as an upstream opportunity sector where investments have long-term benefits for peace, stability, security, equity, economy, health, and the environment.
• Water is an effective medium to fulfill the global environmental agenda. Investments in addressing water bankruptcy deliver major co-benefits for the global efforts to address its environmental problems while addressing the national security (e.g., employment, national stability, and food security) concerns of the UN member states. Elevating water in the global policy agenda can renew international cooperation, increase the efficiency of environmental investments, and reaccelerate the halted progress of the three Rio Conventions to address climate change, biodiversity loss, and desertification.
• A new global water agenda is urgently needed. Existing agendas and conventional water policies—focused mainly on WASH, incremental efficiency gains and generic IWRM guidelines—are not sufficient for the world’s current water reality. A fresh water agenda must be developed that takes Global Water Bankruptcy as a starting point and uses the 2026 and 2028 UN Water Conferences, the conclusion of the Water Action Decade (2028), and the 2030 SDG 6 timeline as milestones for resetting how the world understands and governs water.

Click the link to read the article on the Circle of Blue website (Brett Walton):

January 20, 2026

The planet’s water reserves are overstretched and polluted, pushing the warming world into a dangerous condition of “water bankruptcy,” argues a new UN University report.

This is not an alarm bell for the future, the report states. Bankruptcy is present today. For water, the world is living beyond its means, draining its underground savings accounts, degrading its ecological foundations, and watching its rain and snow become less reliable and evaporate as the planet warms.

“Bankruptcy tells us that we already have passed this stage of a crisis and are already in a failure mode,” said Kaveh Madani, the report’s lead author. [ed. emphasis mine]

The report favors monetary metaphors – savings accounts, cash flows, insolvency – to explain the state of the world’s water. A business files for bankruptcy when its liabilities are greater than its assets and it needs to restructure. The owners, in other words, admit that their business model has failed and current practices cannot continue.

The planet requires a similar reckoning for water, Madani argued. It is not enough to acknowledge that the planet’s water accounts – its aquifers, lakes, rivers, wetlands, and glaciers – are being drained. Leaders must recognize that new operating rules and ecological guardrails are necessary for life on a hotter planet in which water extraction has been the governing principle for decades.

“When we see insolvency combined with irreversibility, that defines the concept of water bankruptcy,” said Madani, who is also director of the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment, and Health.

Madani calls this a “post-crisis” mindset – not attempting to resurrect a failed system but instead developing a relationship to water that prioritizes adaptability to an unstable environment while also ensuring justice for the world’s vulnerable people. Admitting failure and changing course, he said, is a way “to protect the future.”

The report details a planet that has veered off the rails. Thirty percent of global glacier mass has melted since the 1970s. In the same period, the world has plowed or drained more than a billion acres of wetlands, an area equal to the European Union. Seventy percent of the world’s major aquifers are in long-term decline. Water extraction from aquifers and rivers accelerated after the Second World War, and 70 percent of the supply goes into irrigated agriculture.

The loss of water in those savings accounts, when paired with other risks, presents a more worrisome picture, Madani said. Pollutants from industry, agriculture, and untreated human waste reduce the amount of high-quality water. Soils are degraded and accumulating salts. The number of water conflicts is rising. Rural water shortages have prompted an exodus toward cities. Meanwhile, inadequate infrastructure investment means that 2.1 billion people do not have clean water at home and 3.4 billion do not have safe sanitation.

It is perhaps not surprising that the Eurasia Group named water conflict as one of its top political risks of 2026.

Madani, who was deputy head of Iran’s environment department in 2017-18, has been using the bankruptcy language since at least 2021 to describe his home country’s dire water situation. Tehran, whose reservoirs are frightfully low, is the latest city to face the prospect of a Day Zero scenario of dry taps.

To reduce the risk of conflict and shortages, the report recommends a wholesale restructuring. Governments could trim water rights and water claims to more align demand with supply and rebuild institutions that allow for continuous adjustment in an unstable environment. Madani acknowledged that reforms at such scale will not be easy, but they ought to be embraced widely because all areas face risks.

“What matters is how you manage your budget, not how rich you are,” he said. “So you can be poor and not get bankrupt and you can be very rich and get bankrupt if you don’t adjust your lifestyle according to your budget.”

All of these changes need to be rooted in justice, argued Madani, who sees a world cleaved in two. Richer areas with diversified economies are better positioned to withstand water shocks. California, for example, which weathered a deep drought in 2014-15. On the other side are poorer societies whose livelihoods are inseparable from farming. Water shortages hit these areas hard. Madani said economic transformation toward less water-intensive jobs is essential for social, political, and ecological durability.

Despite the daunting outlook, Madani views bankruptcy as a fresh start and a way to position water as a bridge-building issue that crosses political chasms.

“We are not naive about the problems of the international world or the diplomatic world,” Madani said. “But at the same time, we think that it is possible to think about water differently, to tell stories that are different, to tell stories that are less dividing, if they are more inclusive and are reflective of the concerns of the Global South, and if we do so, then we can earn their trust and bring them to the negotiations table and do a better job together.”

Click the link to read the article on the Sky-Hi News website (Ryan Spencer). Here’s an excerpt:

January 17, 2026

Colorado’s statewide snowpack has again hit record-lows, and could remain there for several days as the state is expected to enter a dry spell until the last week of January. Colorado Assistant State Climatologist Peter Goble described the snow season as “a bummer so far.” With each passing day that this low-snow trend continues, Goble said the less likely it becomes that the state will see enough snow to dig itself out of its snowpack deficit.

“It’s likely to get worse before it gets better,” he said. “We’re starting to look at the rest of the snow season and see a limited runway for improvements. It’s not impossible, but it’s not probable either.” [ed. emphasis mine]

The snowpack statewide has sat at the zeroth percentile, meaning it’s the worst on record, since Wednesday, and remained there as of Friday, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Snow Telemetry or SNOTEL program. It’s at least the third time the statewide snowpack has hit record-lows so far this season. The snowpack also hit record-lows in late November and late December. Midway into January, Colorado is “rapidly approaching the halfway point of a normal snow season,” Goble said. With most forecasts calling for little-to-no snow for at least the next seven days, he said it is likely the state will enter February at or near record lows…As of Friday, Colorado’s snowpack sat at 4.8 inches of snow-water equivalent, more than 3 inches below the median of 7.1 inches that is more typical of this time of year, according to SNOTEL data. Statewide, the median peak snowpack has occurred on April 8, with a snow-water equivalent of 16.7 inches. While it is too early to call this winter the worst in Colorado’s history, the state is “not keeping good company at this point in the season,” Goble said. The snow-water equivalent so far this season is about an inch below where it was during the 2011-12 season, which was one of the worst winters in the 21st century. The season so far is more comparable to the winters of 1980-81 and 1976-77, which is often considered the worst winter in Colorado history. Since Colorado’s SNOTEL system wasn’t fully built out in those years, it is hard to make direct comparisons to those historically poor snow years, Goble said. Notably, the winter of 1980-81 saw a significant amount of snow later in the year, and ended the season far better than it started. While he said he is hopeful this season will see significant late-season snow, it is far from certain.

Click the link to read the article on The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel website (Dennis Webbs). Here’s an excerpt:

January 14 2026

Colorado’s snowpack levels remain meager so far this winter season, with little moisture in the near-term local forecast in a year when water managers can scarcely afford a poor spring runoff season due to low storage levels downstream in Lake Powell. The state’s snowpack stood at 63% of median as of Tuesday, according to the federal Natural Resources Conservation Service. Levels range from 76-77% in some basins in far-northern Colorado to 58% in the Colorado River headwaters and just 50% in the Arkansas River basin. The Gunnison River Basin is at 63% of median.

The NRCS said in a news release that warm and dry conditions have led to the below-normal snowpack conditions. Climatologist Allie Mazurek with The Colorado Climate Center said in a December blog post that September-November was the fourth-warmest on record for that period for Colorado, with November in specific being third-warmest on record. Some Western Slope locations had their warmest fall on record, Mazurek wrote. The conditions have challenged ski resorts that have opened later, and with limited terrain. But Powderhorn Mountain Resort announced Saturday that it would be boosting its operations through the opening of its West End Lift the following day, following a 15-inch storm and cooler temperatures that allowed around-the-clock snowmaking.

Click on a thumbnail graphic to view a gallery of drought data from the US Drought Monitor website.

Click the link to go to the US Drought Monitor website. Here’s an excerpt:

This Week’s Drought Summary

It was a more active week nationwide, with significant precipitation across the central Plains, Midwest, and Southeast. Parts of Mississippi and Alabama received more than 5 inches of rain. In the Plains and Midwest, much of the precipitation fell as rain rather than snow due to unseasonably warm temperatures. Portions of the Southwest and central Rocky Mountains also received beneficial rain and snow, slowing drought intensification and leading to localized improvements. Temperatures were warmer than normal across most of the country, with near- to slightly below-normal temperatures limited to the West and Southwest. The largest departures occurred in the upper Midwest and northern Plains, where temperatures were 15–20°F above normal…

High Plains

Above-normal precipitation occurred across eastern Colorado, Kansas, and southeast Nebraska, falling primarily as rain and infiltrating soils due to warm temperatures. Much of the rest of the region remained dry. Temperatures were 10–15°F above normal across most areas, with parts of the Dakotas and eastern Montana 15–20°F above normal. Southeast Colorado was the only area near to below normal. Abnormally dry and moderate drought conditions improved in southeast Nebraska, eastern Kansas, and parts of south-central Colorado. Drought expanded across eastern Wyoming, west-central South Dakota, and northeast Colorado…

West

Above-normal precipitation occurred across southeast Arizona, western and central New Mexico, parts of Colorado, and western Washington. Temperatures were mixed, with California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico up to 5°F below normal, while northern areas were 5–10°F above normal and parts of central Montana 15–20°F above normal. Most drought changes reflected improvement, including moderate drought and abnormally dry conditions in western Montana and central Idaho, severe drought in western Colorado, and severe to extreme drought in eastern Arizona, western New Mexico, eastern Nevada, and western Utah. However, drought expanded in southwest Idaho and northern Nevada, extreme and exceptional drought expanded in central Colorado, and abnormally dry and moderate drought conditions expanded across much of eastern Wyoming…

South

Temperatures were above normal across nearly the entire region, with departures of 9–12°F above normal in the east and 6–9°F above normal across Texas and Oklahoma. Northern Louisiana, Mississippi, central and eastern Tennessee, and southeast Arkansas received well above-normal precipitation, with southern Mississippi recording 200–400% of normal. Central and southern Texas, eastern Oklahoma, and Arkansas remained largely dry. Drought improvements occurred across Mississippi, southern Louisiana, and eastern Tennessee, including improvements to severe drought in northwest Mississippi and northern Louisiana. In contrast, drought expanded across much of Arkansas and eastern and southern Texas. Extreme drought expanded across south Texas, with a new area in northeast Texas. Moderate and severe drought also expanded across east Texas into Arkansas, while abnormally dry conditions increased in central Texas and western Oklahoma. Severe drought expanded from eastern Arkansas into western Tennessee…

Looking Ahead

Over the next five to seven days, much of the western half of the U.S. is anticipated to be dry from the West into the Plains. The wettest areas are anticipated to be over the Great Lakes region and into the Northeast. At the end of the period, there could be some coastal precipitation in portions of south and east Texas as well as Louisiana. Temperatures during this time are anticipated to well above normal over the West, with departures of 10-13°F above normal from Nevada into Utah and Wyoming. Cooler-than-normal temperatures will be commonplace over the eastern half of the country, with the greatest departures over the upper Midwest and Great Lakes with departures of 10-13°F normal. The below-normal temperatures will migrate all the way into the South, with portions of the Southeast and Florida 6-9°F below normal.

The 6-10 day outlooks show that the likelihood of above-normal temperatures over much of the Southwest and southern Plains. The best chances of below-normal temperatures will be over the upper Midwest and into the Northeast. From the northern Plains into the Southeast and Florida and areas east of here have the best chances of below normal temperatures. Precipitation is expected to be below normal over Florida and the coastal areas of the Pacific Northwest. The best chances of above-normal precipitation are anticipated over the Tennessee Valley as well as over the Rocky Mountains and into the Southwest.

Just for grins here’s a slideshow of early January US Drought Monitor maps for the past few years.