Limit water use, CT officials urge
As drought conditions continue to spread across Connecticut, officials on Thursday began advising residents to reduce water consumption and avoid unnecessary irrigation of lawns and gardens.
The hot weather and clear skies that were a fixture across southern New England in June — driving crowds of beachgoers to the shore — have continued to cause parched conditions in the region, weather experts said. All of Connecticut is currently experiencing abnormally dry or drought conditions, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, which reported none of those conditions anywhere in the state three months ago.
On Thursday, Gov. Ned Lamont approved a recommendation by the state's Interagency Drought Working Group to declare an “emerging drought event,” prompting officials to request that residents take voluntary measures to reduce their water use.
“Residents should be mindful of their water consumption and take sensible steps to reduce impacts on other water uses and on the environment,” Lamont said. “We must begin early steps now to mitigate the potential for harm should the drought become prolonged.”
Gary Lessor, the chief meteorologist at the Connecticut Weather Center, said Thursday that some parts of Connecticut along the coast have seen rainfall two inches below normal since June 1, and more than 5.5. Inches below normal since the start of the year.
Further inland, near Hartford, Lessor said that rainfall is also below historic averages, though not by as much.
“We are starting to see the drought accelerating,” Lessor said, adding “We don't really see any big changes to the forecast going forward to September.”
Dry conditions are not unheard of in Connecticut, which has entered its current stage, Phase Two, of drought management five times in the last two decades, most recently in 2020. That drought, which lasted for several months, eventually rose to Phase Three levels and prompted federal disaster declarations in parts of Connecticut, New York and Massachusetts.
So far, however, there have been no reports of adverse impacts such as wells drying up or reservoirs lowering in Connecticut, said Martin Heft, an undersecretary in the Office of Policy & Management and chair of the Interagency Drought Workgroup.
“If that was the case, we'd probably be at a different stage already,” Heft said.
Mandatory water restrictions do not kick in until Phase Four of the state's drought mitigation plan, Heft said. At that point, according to the plan, farmers may be experiencing complete crop loss and public utilities can be expected to take emergency measures in response to the drought.
In a letter to public water systems and local health officials on Thursday, Department of Public Health Environmental Health and Drinking Water Branch Chief Lori Mathieu asked officials to review their emergency plans and advise the agency of any worsening drought conditions.
The dry weather began in Connecticut shortly before the start of the annual season for harvesting strawberries and other earlysummer fruits, prompting some farmers in eastern Connecticut to increase the irrigation of their fields.
Don Tuller, the owner of Tulmeadow Farm in Simsbury, said the drought had caused a minor setback for his crops of pumpkins and sweet corn, which are tough to irrigate. He said he's heard farmers in other areas of the state complain that their fields look as parched as they normally do in late August.
“It really depends on where you are, what your crop is and whether you have irrigation or not,” said Tuller, adding that larger farms tend to have sophisticated — and expensive — irrigation systems to help them through dry periods.
“There's a lot of folks that just don't have the capacity to do that,” he said.
Lessor — whose forecast called for a hot, dry summer earlier this year — said Thursday that temperatures will continue to rise across Connecticut heading into August, and that drought conditions are likely to get worse.
“One thing that could end everything really quick would be a tropical system,” Lessor said, referring to a hurricane or tropical storm. “But at this point, there's nothing really out there.”
The Atlantic hurricane season, which began in June, is predicted to be particularly busy this year, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association. So far, there have been three named storms, none of which have made landfall in the northeastern United States.