Drought expands across the area

Drought has expanded in southern Minnesota and northern Iowa, and now all of our counties are categorized in at least Severe to Extreme drought. Portions of Freeborn and Mower counties are categorized in Exceptional drought, the highest drought classification. There will be some shower activity Friday, especially AM to early afternoon, but it will barely put a scratch in the current drought. A change in the pattern by the end of next week may provide some assistance as well, but at this point we’ll need prolonged periods of precipitation to boost us out of the drought.