Saskatchewan Rivals The Driest Places On Earth This Spring!

At first, I knew it was a dry spring and when I read the latest numbers tweeted by Tiffany at Global News Regina, I was not surprised. Only 9.6mm fell in the city of Regina over the month of May.

A look at how little precipitation we have had this May, compared to last year and the normal. #YQR #Sask #SKstorm pic.twitter.com/1ZVomfutK0

— Tiffany Lizée (@TiffanyGlobal) June 2, 2015

Then today, I read a tweet from Peter at Global News in Saskatoon. Only 0.4mm fell in the city of Saskatoon during the month of May. I had to ask if this was a mistake and he meant centimeters.

Driest May ever recorded in #yxe. Exclusive summer outlook @GlobalSaskatoon EN6/NHF10 http://t.co/02scu148Fg #skstorm pic.twitter.com/CEePTHorK3

— Peter Quinlan (@PQuinlanGlobal) June 2, 2015

Nope! Here is the provided official climate data from Environment Canada:

Environment Canada Climate Data

After doing some checking of the driest places on Earth, I found the the Sahara Desert gets approximately 7mm of rain during the month of May. Among the listed driest places on Earth, Waidi Halfa, Sudan gets 2.4mm of rain annually while parts of Egypt, Libya, Chile and the Antarctic get even less to none!

The current long term forecast shows no major change to this dry trend in Saskatchewan. In fact, nothing of significance at all for at least 2 more weeks. People need to take this very seriously in Regina where the city is pleading with residents to cut back on water use. Sadly, with so many new and younger residents, they have no idea what a major drought can do here. Its been a long time since the last major drought but both the "Dirty 30s" and droughts in 1988 and 2000-03 (Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan:Drought) had devastating effects on the economy and living conditions, not only here but in a massive ripple down effect since Saskatchewan is still considered the "breadbasket of North America".