Hmm… same as the were about the time of the Great Pacific Climate shift (look it up if you’re not familiar with it)
River levels are as low as in 1976 after another very dry week across England and Wales, the Environment Agency said.
In its latest drought briefing, the government agency said all areas had seen less than 1mm of rain, except for the South-west which received 1mm in the past week.
The agency said most reservoirs were now below normal levels and river flows were decreasing. All rivers are experiencing lower than normal flows, with two-thirds “exceptionally” low.
Rivers are at similar levels to March 1976, when the country was hit by severe drought. The agency said small streams and ponds were drying up in Herefordshire, Oxfordshire and Yorkshire, hitting wildlife.
In August of 1976 it had not really rained in England for over a year but we had two wonderful summers until September 1976 when it started to rain and it was still raining in May of 1977 so much so that the ground was saturated down to at least three feet. How do I know it was that depth? Well, I was in the United States Air Force at the time and stationed in RAF Uxbridge and we had to get a disused trailer (part of a tractor trailer rig) out of an area that, over the years, had become enclosed by buildings. The only was to get the trailer out was to get a 100 foot cane to act as a tractor by putting a sling under the front of the trailer and drag it to a spot where it could then be re- slung and lifted clear and onto the road. We got the trailer onto a grassed area, its rear wheels still on concrete, and rested its landing wheels on an eight foot long, two inch by ten inch plank, as the ground was a bit soft, to say the least, and it was pelting down rain and had been since the previous September. Thinking the trailer was secure on the plank some one got on top of the trailer and disconnected the sling to get it into the new position so that the trailer could be lifted and put on the road. That’s when the fun began: The weight of the trailer slowly, for a few seconds and then rapidly, began to force the the plank into the rain saturated ground, the right side much further and faster than the left side and the poor guy on the roof of the trailer slid off the roof and sank into the soft ground up to his ankles. Needless there was a lot of laughter and still is whenever I think of it but the job was eventually finished. Nobody was hurt and nothing damaged,except for the grass. We had a sloping trench that went from about a half foot in depth to three feet to fill in that was the end of it all.
Why get excited about low water? It has happened before and it will happen again and it always comes right in the end. Every time there is a drought in England the government says that it will build a national water grid but they never do mainly because it starts to rain and everyone forgets about it and starts to moan about how damp it is. At least in ’75 and ’76 we had hot summers; this time we have had no summers to speak of for the last three years.
“Normal” is arrived at by averaging a sample of flows taken over some period of time. Those samples will be above or below “normal” most of the time. From a standpoint of math, averaging 49 and 51 gets you an average of 50. So does averaging 2 and 98. Chicken Little said, “The sky is falling.”