Drought — Smith, Tennessee

2023-12-01 to 2023-12-31 · Smith, Tennessee

Event narrative

Moderate to severe drought conditions from November 2023 across Smith County worsened in December with severe to extreme drought conditions across the county.

Wider weather episode

As abnormally dry conditions continued across Middle Tennessee, drought conditions worsened across the area. By the end of December, severe drought conditions expanded to about 85 percent of the area with about 64 percent of that in the extreme drought category. Extreme drought conditions expanded across southern Middle Tennessee as well as the Cumberland Plateau. Slight drought improvements noted in November across the northwest worsened once again where rainfall deficits only increased. At the end of 2023, Nashville's yearly rainfall total was 11.45 inches below normal. Clarksville's yearly rainfall total was 4.85 inches below normal while Crossville was 7.36 inches below the yearly normal.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1146478. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.