Drought — Marshall Islands, Guam

2025-05-01 to 2025-05-31 · Marshall Islands, Guam

Event narrative

Wotje started May in D3 (Extreme) drought and would remain in D3 through the month, receiving 4.34 inches of rain for the month of May. Wotje received 2 inches of that rain on May 20th, but is was unclear weather this rain took to the soil or was subject to runoff. Utirik started May in D2 (Severe) drought and would degrade to D3 May 13th and remaining at D3 through the rest of the month, ending with a monthly total of 2.38 inches of rain. Kwajalein and Ailinglapalap entered May in D2 drought, and while Ailinglapalap would remain in D2, Kwajalein would briefly improve to D1 (Moderate) drought on May 13th after seeing 1.92 inches during a week of reporting, but would return to D2 on May 20th. Kwajalein ended the month with 4.37 inches and Ailinglapalap ended the month with 6.95 inches, with about half of this amount falling during the last ten days of May. Jaluit, Majuro and Mili remained at D1 or better. Impact reports from the Marshall Islands were limited.

Wider weather episode

Prolong periods of dry weather continued across the Marshall Islands causing drought to worsen, especially for the northern islands near and north of 7N. Pingelap in Pohnpei State saw little to no precipitation during the last two weeks of April, so drought worsen while most islands across the Federated State of Micronesia saw 1.5 inches or more of rain.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1274675. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.