California is Free of Drought for The First Time in 25 YearsBy Clara Harter After experiencing one of the wettest holiday seasons on record, California hit a majormilestone this week — having zero areas of abnormal dryness for the first time in 25 years. Thedata, collected by the U.S. Drought Monitor, is a welcome nugget of news for Golden State*residents, who in the last 15 years alone have lived through two of the worst droughts on record,the worst wildfire seasons on record, and the most destructive wildfires ever. Right now, thewildfire risk across California is “about as close to zero as it ever gets,” and there is likely noneed to worry about the state’s water supply for the rest of the year, said UC climate scientistDaniel Swain. Currently, 14 of the state’s 17 major water supply reservoirs are at 70% or morecapacity, according to the California Department of Water Resources. California’s last drought lasted more than 1,300 days, from February 2020 to October 2023,at which point just 0.7% of the state remained abnormally dry, thanks to a series of winteratmospheric rivers that showered the Golden State with rain. Before that, California was in asevere drought from 2012 through 2016. But the last time 0% of the California map had anylevel of abnormally dry or drought conditions was all the way back in December 2000. In recentweeks, a series of powerful winter storms and atmospheric rivers have swept across California,dumping heavy rain that soaked soils, filled reservoirs, and left much of the state unusually wetfor this time of year. “This is certainly a less destructive winter weather than last year was,”Swain said. He noted, however, that “as we move forward, we do expect to be dealing withincreasingly extreme [weather] swings.” Though it may seem counterintuitive, climate change is forecast to lead to both moreintense droughts and more intense episodes of rainfall. This is because a warmer atmospherepulls more moisture out of soils and plants, deepening droughts. At the same time, a warmeratmosphere holds more water vapor, which is then released in fewer, more extreme rainstorms.Scientists have coined a name for this phenomenon — the atmospheric sponge effect — whichSwain said is “hopefully an evocative visual analogy that describes why, as the climate warms,we actually are likely to see wider swings between extremely wet conditions and extremely dryconditions.” A key example of this effect is the weather pattern in the run-up to the devastatingPalisades and Eaton fires last year. In 2022 and 2023, California experienced extremely wet winters. Mammoth Mountain, forexample, set an all-time record for snowfall in the 2022-23 season. But then Southern Californiaexperienced one of the driest periods on record in the fall and winter of 2024, which enabled thesubsequent devastation of January 2025’s firestorm. Much of the West has seenwarmer-than-average temperatures and relatively little snow so far this winter. Researchpublished in the aftermath of the fire examines how this extremely wet to extremely dry weathersequence is especially dangerous for wildfires in Southern California because heavy rainfall leadsto high growth of grass and brush, which then becomes abundant fuel during periods of extremedryness. Fortunately, California should be clear of water supply risks and wildfire danger forseveral months to come, Swain said, but in the long term, residents should expect to see moreof this weather whiplash.*California can be referred to as “The Golden State”.(Available at: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2026-01-09/california-has-no-areas-of-dryness-firsttime-in-25-years – text specially adapted for this test). The underlined word “extremely” in “we actually are likely to see wider swings between extremely wet conditions” (l. 26) is an

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adverb modifying an adjective.

adjective modifying a noun.

adjective modifying an adjective.

adjective modifying an adverb.