Exceptional drought disappears from Colorado for first the time since February
Recent rain has allowed the overall drought situation in Colorado to improve. While 82% of the state still has at least moderate drought, the worse drought category has vanished from the state for the first time since late February.
The weekly drought monitor released Thursday morning shows Denver and most of the Front Range still has moderate drought while most of the foothills are now considered "abnormally dry" which is an improvement.
The last time exceptional drought did not appear in Colorado was during the final week in February 2022.
Most of the Rocky Mountain National Park region as well as Walden the North Park region are now completely drought free while only 5% of the state has extreme drought (the second worse drought category) including the Four Corners region and far northeast Colorado including Julesburg. That's a small improvement from a week ago.
The most significant drought improvement in the last week was the "severe drought" category which dropped from including 45% of the state a week ago to just 32% of the state now including much of the Western Slope.
With more showers and thunderstorms in the forecast through Saturday, more improvements are expected to the drought map next week.
