2017 Off to Wet Start Following Dry 2016

2017 is off to a wet start, trying to make up for a very dry 2016.

Since 7 a.m. on Sunday, 2.08 inches of rain has been recorded in downtown Toccoa as of 6 a.m. Tuesday.

That comes after 2016, when just 36.38 inches of precipitation was recorded at the WNEG studios in downtown Toccoa.

That marks the driest year in Toccoa in at least a decade.

In that time, the lowest yearly precipitation total recorded at the WNEG studios was 37.65 inches in 2007.

In 2015, downtown Toccoa received 71.45 inches of precipitation, 47.96 inches in 2014, 84.04 inches in 2013, and 50.05 inches in 2012.

The dry year that was also shows in a look at the U.S. Drought Monitor.

The last report for 2016 shows that almost all of Stephens County remains in the most severe level on the drought monitor scale, “exceptional drought.”

Almost all of Franklin County and much of Habersham County also remain in “exceptional drought” entering 2017.

Overall, about 26.5 percent of the state was in “exceptional drought” as of the end of 2016, compared to the end of 2015, when no part of the state was in that most severe category.