This story was produced in partnership by Inside Climate News and the Texas Newsroom, the state’s network of public radio stations.
CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas—Recent rainfall in South Texas has pushed off the projected date of emergency water restrictions in Corpus Christi by three months, the city announced Tuesday, amid growing hope that a powerful global climate phenomenon this year could wash away the region’s historic drought.
Lake Texana, the smallest of Corpus Christi’s three reservoirs, rebounded from record lows last month when it received its first inflows in eight months. Worst-case projections in mid-April showed the lake going dry by summer. Now it should last until early next year, at least.
“We are pleased to share the positive news,” said Nicholas Winkelmann, chief operating officer of Corpus Christi Water, in a Tuesday announcement.
It’s one small step in a regional water crisis that has developed over decades. But the short bridge that recent rains provided goes a long way to helping the region narrowly avoid a disaster, local water planners say. Expectations of a powerful “super El Niño” event this year suggest that intensely wet weather could return to the Coastal Bend of Texas this fall, potentially putting water into the region’s largest reservoirs, which have fallen to critical levels.
