{"id":745288,"date":"2026-04-22T12:04:24","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T12:04:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/745288\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T12:04:24","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T12:04:24","slug":"edwards-aquifer-rose-10-feet-after-recent-rain-is-it-enough-to-put-a-dent-in-drought-conditions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/745288\/","title":{"rendered":"Edwards Aquifer rose 10 feet after recent rain. Is it enough to put a dent in drought conditions?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\"><strong>SAN ANTONIO <\/strong> \u2013 More rain has fallen in the past few days than the rest of 2026 combined, boosting the Edwards Aquifer 10 feet since Friday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">The numbers are a huge deal since the aquifer is the San Antonio area\u2019s main source of drinking water. It is made up of a series of caves far beneath our feet that act like a sponge when it rains.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">At impact levels, it has to rain directly on the aquifer recharge zone, which runs from Kinney County in the west to Hays County in the east.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Since Saturday, some areas of the recharge zone have received up to 6 inches of rain.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Rain like this is crucial because the region has been in a consistent drought for more than four years since January 2022.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">Last May, it hit its lowest levels since conservation began. That hovers around 40 feet below the average amount of water that\u2019s supposed to be in there. That has helped trigger drought restrictions to which South Texans have become accustomed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">So while the soaking rain over the past few days has been helpful, it has not put a huge dent in the problem.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cIn order to get out of drought, we would need 30 inches of rain, so when we think about how much we got over the weekend and on Monday, we\u2019d need about 3 to 4 more of those kinds of rainfall events to truly get out of drought,\u201d KSAT Weather Authority\u2019s Sarah Spivey said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">While this important topic is crucial to follow, there is no need to panic about our drinking water supply.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">\u201cSAWS (San Antonio Water System) has the Edwards Aquifer as a water supply, but it also has other water sources,\u201d Spivey said. \u201dSo it\u2019s not just only the Edwards Aquifer, it\u2019s just that the Edwards Aquifer is the largest source of our drinking water in San Antonio.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\">To learn more about the aquifer and to watch Spivey and KSAT Weather Authority\u2019s Justin Horne dive into the Edwards Aquifer cave system, click <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ksat.com\/ksat-explains\/2022\/02\/09\/how-does-the-edwards-aquifer-work-why-is-it-so-heavily-regulated-ksat-explains\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">here<\/a> to watch the KSAT Explains episode.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__TextBase-sc-1fnzlkn-3 bYFsJw cuqaEv article-text\"><b>Read also: <\/b><\/p>\n<ul class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 kDvXdO font_openSans articleList\">\n<li class=\"dist__Box-sc-1fnzlkn-0 dist__StackBase-sc-1fnzlkn-7 ecGWWE iQviKm\"\/><\/ul>\n<p>Copyright 2026 by KSAT &#8211; All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN ANTONIO \u2013 More rain has fallen in the past few days than the rest of 2026 combined,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":745289,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5133],"tags":[5229,6772,61761,746,2824,8773,7202,7203,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,313],"class_list":["post-745288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-america","tag-drought","tag-edwards-aquifer","tag-environment","tag-outdoors","tag-rainfall","tag-san-antonio","tag-sanantonio","tag-texas","tag-tx","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-weather"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116448268755578024","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745288","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=745288"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745288\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/745289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=745288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=745288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=745288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}