The drought in the western United States has reached its fourth year with drought conditions covering 73.47% of the 11 western states including 99.86% of land in California.
Due to these drought conditions, wildfire season in the West and California has been particularly severe in 2015. In 2014, NOAA scientists identified the main drivers of the drought were decadal scale sea surface temperature variation as well as short-term atmospheric variability.
