It was a very dry year in Yachats.
Again.
Yachats received a total of 50.43 inches in rain in 2019 — the second-lowest amount of rain over the past 10 years of record keeping by the city of Yachats.
It was the second consecutive dry year in Yachats this decade. Until 2019, the second-lowest rainfall in the last decade was recorded in 2018.
The only other year in the past 10 years with less rain was in 2013, when the city recorded 47.77 inches at its monitoring station at the wastewater treatment center on West Seventh Street.
The 2019 total was almost two feet less than the 10-year average total of 73.48 inches.
December’s rainfall total was 7.26 inches, four inches below average.
December was one of eight months when rainfall was below the average for those same months the previous 10 years.
The normally rainy months of March, October and November were exceptionally dry – totaling just 7.86 inches for the three months compared with a 10-year average of 29.05 inches for those months.
Only four months in 2019 — February, April, July and September — had more rain than the 10-year average for individual months.
The dry year led the city of Yachats to institute first-phase water restrictions during September, but those lasted a little more than a month before rain came and tourists – who can push demand to capacity – left.