Rain takes a bite out of drought

So, sick of all the rain yet?

Amazing, isn't it, how a few raindrops can change your outlook on things.

For after not raining for something like 40 days and 40 nights, Mother Nature unleashed her watery fury this week, dropping more than three inches of rain locally. On three separate days this week, rainfall has totaled more than three-quarters of an inch.

Officially since Sunday, Greencastle weather watcher Diana Foust reports, the city has recorded 3.14 inches of rain.

That divides up to .87 inches with quite a lightning show on Sunday, .82 inches over two storms on Thursday, followed by another 1.45 inches reported on Friday (totals are reported at 7 a.m. daily for the preceding 24-hour period).

All the recent rain means that Putnam County -- one of the state's driest areas over June and July with just a .62-inch two-month total (.34 in June and .28 in July) -- has experienced more precipitation in the last five days than in the previous two months combined.

Locally April and May combined for 7.44 inches of rain in Greencastle, with 3.5 falling in May. But the area saw rain on only four of the final 27 days of May as the drought began to set in.

According to this week's U.S. Drought Monitor, severe to exceptional drought conditions continue over much of Indiana despite recent rainfall of 2-5 inches over portions of Indiana.

The recent rains have improved local drought conditions. However, widespread rainfall of about an inch every 10 days continuing through October is necessary to end the Drought of 2012 in Indiana.

Putnam County remains in the severe to possibly exceptional drought condition area continuing over portions of the southwest quadrangle of the state roughly bounded by Interstate 74 on the north, Interstate 65 on east, the Ohio River on the south and the Indiana-Illinois state line on the west.

Portions of the area have received less than an inch of rainfall since the beginning of August. Also, much of the south-central and southeast Indiana areas have received little or no rainfall since the beginning of August and drought conditions have worsened.