Tagged: monsoons

Despite a wet monsoon season, Flagstaff is still in a drought.

The low water level has the city water department waiting for next spring.

Brad Hill, Director of Utilities for the City of Flagstaff reports that Upper Lake Mary is currently at 23% of its full capacity.

Hill says the 5-year-average at this time of year is 49%.

Lake Mary supplies about half of Flagstaff’s water supply, the other half coming from aquifers.

Hill says the lake isn’t filling because the forests soak up the water.  

Officials in northeastern Arizona say more than a week of consistent rain is causing flooding downstream of the Wallow Fire burn area. The flooding has forest officials and residents on alert.

Last summer, the Wallow Fire became the largest wildfire in state history after it burned nearly 540 thousand acres and destroyed dozens of homes in Arizona and New Mexico.  Now, officials say monsoon rains are causing flash flooding in some of the scarred areas downstream of the burn.