CHAMPAIGN COUNTY – Champaign County is not experiencing drought for the first time since last fall.
The drought was one of the most intense dry spells in the county in the past 20 years, according to U.S. Drought Monitor data and was brought on by less precipitation than normal in East Central Illinois.
Champaign County came out of it at the end of April.
“Soil moisture is in better shape,” Illinois State Climatologist Trent Ford said. “Our streams are higher.”
That’s due to above average precipitation in March and April, according to Ford.
He also said rain in the state is changing and it tends to come in heavy short bursts, which can make it hard for the soil to absorb.
“What that rain does or how it interacts with the land is very different if we get an inch in an hour versus an inch over 12 hours.”
More intense rainfall can increase the risk of flood and drought.
“The soil has only so much of a capacity to take in water, and if the rainfall rate exceeds that capacity of the soil to take in water, then the soil might not even be saturated,” Ford said. “But the rain is running off.”
However, Illinois is ultimately not likely to become more prone to droughts.
“It’s the characteristics of the drought that change more so than the frequency,” Ford explained. “And what that means is we can kind of flip between too wet and too dry much more quickly than we did previously.”
March and April also saw higher than average temperatures. March temperatures were consistently 10 to 25 degrees higher than normal in the first half of the month, and Champaign-Urbana set a new all-time high temperature record of 88 degrees. April was the warmest April recorded in Illinois since 1895.
Although the region did not get a late May freeze this year, warmer Aprils can put crops at risk, Ford said.
“What that means is that warm April can actually push those trees or those bushes or those vines farther along and make them more vulnerable to even just a single night where we get below freezing,” he said.
Warmer Aprils do not mean the region won’t still see May freezes, Ford said.
Looking ahead to the El Niño
Experts are warning of an extremely strong El Niño this year. The naturally occurring climate phenomenon is characterized by unusually warm ocean surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean.
The event impacts global temperatures and rainfall patterns, according to the World Meteorological Organization. Worldwide, the El Niño will likely cause above normal land surface temperatures. For example, 2024 was the hottest year on record because of the El Niño and the climate crisis.
The event will also likely cause increased rainfall in parts of southern South America, the southern U.S., the Horn of Africa and central Asia and a drought in Australia, Indonesia and parts of southern Asia, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
However, Illinois is not expected to be extremely impacted by the El Niño, Ford said.
“An extremely strong El Niño does not mean we have an extremely strong El Niño signal in our weather,” he added. “Those two things are connected, but it’s not a one-to-one correlation.”
In fact, Ford predicts that Illinois likely won’t see any impact from the El Niño until after summer.
“What that means in Illinois tends to be a bit wetter in the fall and warmer and drier in the winter.”