- WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The
drought gripping nearly half the United States is expected to linger for
another six months due to the arrival of a weak El Nino weather phenomenon,
U.S. government forecasters said on Wednesday.
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- Much of the U.S. Plains states, the West and parts of
the Midwest and South have seen corn fields wither, grazing pastures shrivel
and forests turn into kindling this summer due to unrelenting high temperatures
and lack of rain.
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- The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said
El Nino, an evolving global weather anomaly already wreaking havoc in Southeast
Asia, would provide only limited drought relief when it arrives in the
U.S. this autumn.
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- About half of the U.S. is already experiencing some degree
of drought, ranging from mild to extreme.
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- "While some improvement in the drought is possible,
namely across the Southwest and southern and central Plains states, it
may not be enough to alleviate dry conditions entirely, particularly in
the Northwest, Northeast, mid-Atlantic and the Ohio Valley," said
Jack Kelly, director of NOAA's National Weather Service.
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- El Nino, or "little boy" in Spanish, is expected
to impact U.S. weather patterns starting later this month and ending next
spring. The weather phenomenon is an above-average warming of water in
the eastern Pacific that occurs every four to five years.
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- Experts say this year's El Nino will be much milder than
the devastating 1997-98 episode, which claimed 24,000 lives and caused
an estimated $25 billion in damage worldwide.
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- "We've had our eyes on this El Nino for months,
and understand it well enough to predict its likely impacts months in advance,"
said Jim Laver, director of NOAA's Climate Prediction Center.
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- NOAA predicted that El Nino would bring scant rainfall
and snow to a northern tier of U.S. states as well as the mid-Atlantic
and Midwest.
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- However, El Nino would unleash beneficial wet weather
throughout the southern half of the United States, stretching from California
to the Carolinas.
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- The prolonged drought has scorched U.S. wheat, corn and
soybean crops, which will be the smallest in years. Some areas of Nebraska,
Kansas and Montana have been likened to the devastating "Dust Bowl"
of the 1930s.
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- Earlier on Thursday, the U.S. Agriculture Department
said crop-wilting drought would cut the corn harvest to 8.85 billion bushels,
soybean crop to 2.66 billion bushels and cotton harvest to 18.1 million
bales. The production decline has trimmed global inventories and boosted
prices.
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- Dry weather in the Pacific Northwest could also impact
electricity supplies for that region, which is largely dependent on hydroelectric
power.
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- If NOAA's bleak outlook holds true, drought could play
a major role in November's mid-term elections.
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- The Democratic-led U.S. Senate on Tuesday voted overwhelmingly
to provide drought relief of $6 billion to farmers and ranchers in an election-year
defeat for President Bush's attempts to control federal spending. Enough
Republican senators joined in the vote to provide a veto-proof majority.
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- The Bush administration contends there is ample money
already earmarked for agriculture -- $180 billion through 2012 -- to fund
drought relief. The Republican-controlled House of Representatives has
not approved any drought aid.
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