Severe Drought in South America

Large parts of South America are in the grip of a serious drought. Signs of the drought began to appear in satellite gravimetry observations of southeastern Brazil in mid-2018, and had spread into parts of Paraguay, Bolivia, and northern Argentina by 2020.  “This is the second most intense drought in South America since 2002,” said Matthew Rodell, a hydrologist based at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “The calculation is based on the extent, duration, and volume of water lost during the drought as measured by the GRACE and GRACE-FO satellites.” A drought in eastern Brazil and Venezuela in 2015-16 is the only more intense drought on the record. - NASA