(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2011-04)
Zeng, Wei; Kim, Inchul
Georgia Drought Management Plan (Drought Plan), which was approved by Georgia Department of Natural Resources Board On March 26, 2003, experienced the first comprehensive test by the 2006-2008 drought. Signs of drought conditions first appeared in the spring of 2006. With the exception of a short period of relatively healthy precipitation in the fall of 2006, hydrologic conditions deteriorated in the next year and half, reaching a height in late 2007. The impacts of the drought lingered on through 2008 and early 2009, before heavy precipitation ended this dry period. Georgia Environmental Protection Division has been monitoring the drought indicators prescribed by the Drought Plan. A suite of measures was put in place as responses to lessen the impacts of the drought. Conditions in 2010 seem to resemble those in 2006, raising the potential that another dry period is down the road.