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Precipitation
below normal
By LISA G. CURRIE
Rappahannock News Staff Writer
Though the calendar marked March 21 as the first day of spring, Tuesday morning county residents awoke to find the county covered in a mantle of white —a reminder that spring’s weather, including its rains, isn’t quite here.
“Across the state, the crop moisture index shows things to be slightly above normal,” said Chip Knappenberger, a research assistant with the Office of the State Climatologist at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. The crop moisture index, he explained, measures the moisture at ground level —where it can be absorbed by crops. “And Tuesday’s snow will help with its slow melting and absorption into the ground.”
But it takes quite a bit more snow to register the same amount of moisture compared to rainfall — depending on the moisture content, about 10 inches of snow equals one inch of rain.
Sperryville weather-watcher Dennis Wingfield reports that his records indicate that 1990, so far, has been the dryest in the past five years. This month, for example, through March 19 his rain guage has metered only 6.37 inches, while last year he has measured 8.94 inches, in 1988, 6.48 inches, and in
Se* MOISTURE, p. 14
94.8%