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Alexandria residents are now living under a state drought warning, part of a sweeping expansion announced Friday that placed every Virginia locality under either a watch or warning advisory for the first time this year.
The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, working with the state Drought Monitoring Task Force, extended the warning to 83 counties and 31 cities and issued new drought watches for 12 counties and seven cities. The move means no part of the Commonwealth is free of a drought designation.
Alexandria sits within the Northern Virginia warning area alongside Arlington, Fairfax, Fauquier, Loudoun and Prince William counties and the cities of Fairfax, Falls Church, Manassas and Manassas Park.
A drought warning signals that a significant drought event is imminent, according to DEQ. Because Alexandria draws its water from the Potomac River, the agency directed residents and officials to the Metropolitan Washington Water Supply and Drought Awareness Response Plan for specific conservation triggers and required actions.
Agricultural damage is already widespread statewide, and the risk of wildfires has climbed, DEQ said. The updated state designations align with U.S. Department of Agriculture determinations, potentially making farmers eligible for emergency loans through the Farm Service Agency.
The deterioration has been swift. A DEQ map from Feb. 9 showed large portions of southwestern and southeastern Virginia clear of any advisory. Friday's map shows no such areas remaining.
Rainfall has run below normal across the Commonwealth, with the central and southern regions hit hardest. Soil moisture is much below normal statewide and has dropped sharply over the past two weeks. Streamflow is well below normal, and stream gauges in the Dan, New, and Rappahannock river basins have set provisional single-day record lows. Groundwater has declined across the state and sits much below normal in northern Virginia, along the Blue Ridge Mountains, and near Roanoke.
Temperatures have been significantly warmer than normal, and most of the state is forecast to receive less than a tenth of an inch of rain over the coming week.
A brief change in the weather this weekend is unlikely to move the needle. After a mostly sunny Friday with highs near 82 and a mild Saturday reaching 81, showers are likely late Saturday night, with a 60% chance of precipitation but new amounts of less than a tenth of an inch. Sunday brings an 80% chance of showers, mainly before 2 p.m., with a breezy high near 62 and northwest gusts up to 33 mph. Drier, cooler air follows, with sunny skies Monday and Tuesday and highs climbing back into the upper 70s by midweek.
DEQ said it is working with local governments, public water works, and large water users to ensure drought response plans and ordinances are followed. The agency urged all Virginians to cut back water use, monitor conditions, and repair leaks.
Current drought status is available on the DEQ website.
