Droughts

A drought is a period of drier-than-normal conditions. A drought can last for days, months or years. Drought often has large impacts on the ecosystems and agriculture of affected regions, and causes harm to the local economy. Annual dry seasons in the tropics significantly increase the chances of a drought developing, with subsequent increased wildfire risks. Heat waves can significantly worsen drought conditions by increasing evapotranspiration. This dries out forests and other vegetation, and increases the amount of fuel for wildfires.

severe climatic event (c. 22nd century BCE), defining the beginning of the Meghalayan age, linked to the collapses of the Old Kingdom in Egypt, Akkadian Empire, Liangzhu culture, and Indus Valley Civilization

Rainmaking, also known as artificial precipitation, artificial rainfall and pluviculture, is the act of attempting to artificially induce or increase precipitation, usually to stave off drought or the wider global warming. According to the clouds' different physical properties, this can be done using airplanes or rockets to sow to the clouds with catalysts such as dry ice, silver iodide and salt powder, to make clouds rain or increase precipitation, to remove or mitigate farmland drought, to increase reservoir irrigation water or water supply capacity, to increase water levels for hydropower g

measurement of dryness

thumb|300px|A typical dry lakebed is seen in droughts in California|California, which experienced its worst megadrought in 1,200 years in 2022. The drought was precipitated by [[climate change. California rationed water in response.]] A megadrought is an exceptionally severe drought, lasting for many years and covering a wide area.

Estimate of the soil moisture deficit