Posted: Sun, 31 Jul 2011 05:07 PM - 13,856 Readers

By: John Bumgardner

Central Texas is dry and the lack of rain is on pace to meet or break historical records.

Austin summers are usually hot and humid, with average July and August highs in the mid-90s. In fact Highs exceed 90 degrees 109 days per year, and reach or exceed 100 degrees on at least 12.

Anticipated rain from tropical storm Don fizzled hopes for many. KXAN viewer Marco Gutierrez, however, did see a bit of rain.

In a KXAN viwer submitted video on Saturday around 9:30p.m. Gutierrez said, "I shot this a couple hours ago near Lake Travis. It rained for about 5 minutes."

While it wasn't a measurable amount, it's more than most in our area have seen for weeks.

Sunday temperatures at night have even been hotter than usual. Evening temperatures will hover near 92 degrees around 9p.m. That kind of heat has many Austinites looking for ways to cool down. Children were running through the Liz Carpenter Fountain around 9:00p.m. Saturday looking for relief from the heat.

The highest recorded temperature for Austin was 112 degrees on September 5, 2000. We've seen 46 days of temperatures reaching or exceeding 100 degrees. The forecast high for Sunday should bring that number to 47.

The capital city hasn’t seen a significant amount of rainfall this year. It has even been predicted by most experts as the third worst drought in our history, since record keeping began in the late 1800’s.

In a typical year, the driest month in Austin is January, with 1.89 inches of precipitation, and at 5.03 inches, May is the wettest month. A typical year in Austin drops 36.5 inches of rain.

Because of the low amounts of rain this year, the National Weather Service released new averages . The new average for January has now dropped to 2.22 inches, while July has dropped to 1.88 inches.

In July of 2010 Austin saw 2.32 inches of actual rainfall, since January of this year Austin has only seen a total of 4.17 inches of rain for 2011.

On Lake Travis ten of the 11 public boat ramps have closed, the remaining launch, Mansfield Dam would close if the lake reaches below 630 feet. Current lake levels stand at 640.19.

Historical lows reached below 600 feet in the 1940's and dropped below 620 feet in the 1950's and 1960's. The last time lake levels were below 640 feet was 1985. In 2000 levels hovered just above 640 feet and in 2010 dropped near 630 feet. Lake Travis is considered full at 681 feet.

Meteorologist say if things don’t get better this may be the worst drought in Travis County history.

*  Story Contributed by: John Bumgardner