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Show Rain and Snow in Utah Stay Threat of Drouth Farmers, Livestock Men,Water Officials Hail f Precipitation; More Predicted for Wednesday Fearing a water shortage next summer, heavy damage to range, orchards, winter wheat and other .crop, Utah farmer, livestock men and water official hailed the arrival of warm snow In the valleys the past two or three days were termed "the most valuable thing nature could have done" from the standpoint of the farmers. The rains soaked into th ground, dried during November and December, De-cember, aiding winter wheat protecting pro-tecting fruit tree from winterkill winter-kill and storing moisture In soils so as to be beneficial In the spring, David F. Smith, state commissioner commission-er of agriculture, said. It was feared, Mr. Smith said, that thousands of fruit trees would (Oauttaud sn Pan TwJv I Oolama P1v rains and now Tuesaay. Additional rain and snow were predicted for Sslt Lake City and vicinity Tuesday night and Wed-. Wed-. nesday by th federal weather bureau. bu-reau. With precipitation since October 1, beginning ot the precipitation year, 2.13 Inches below normal in Salt Lake City, the storms wer welcomed by all. Something of the seriousness of condition wa revealed by city water department attache, who . reported only 14 inches of snow at Brighton. Last year on the same date 36 Inches wa recorded. ' It was mowing at Brighton on Tuesday, however, the dty obeerv-. obeerv-. er reported. Water content of th anow at ' Brighton Sunday, reported by the ,. v city observer, was 2.81 Inches in ' 13 Inches of mow then on the ground. There was 10.2 inches of water in 37 Inches of mow on th ground the same day a year ago. Wacat ains that cut away th . . RAIILSNOW STAY! DROUTH THREAT (Ceatkmoi mm Peas Om) have been destroyed had heavy frosts come while soils were still dry and only protected by light coatings of snow. The current storms have been most Intense In northern sections of the Lata, T. H. Humpherys, state engineer, said. HlSxobservers reported 12 Inches of snow on the divide between Falrview and Emery Em-ery county. Snowfall Reported Snowfall in other areas was reported re-ported by Mr. Humpherys as: Richfield, Rich-field, 4 Inches; Sanpete county, 4 Inches; Weber county, 8 Inches; Brigham City, T Inches, and Logan, 10 inches. Most of this snow, however, how-ever, has melted. - Precipitation in Salt Lake City is far below normal, the federal weather bureau records show. Since October 1 there has been 2.08 Inches messured for the current cur-rent precipitation year. Most of this .came In October, when 1.42 Inches wss recorded. There was only a trace In November and .66 Inch In December. Normal for the period Is 4.21 lashes, while a ear. agoUierec-ords agoUierec-ords showed 5.29 -Inches. In 193T It was 4.75 Inches. Precipitation for the calendar year ended Sunday night was far below normal, weather bureau records rec-ords show. Measurements at the Salt Lake office show 10.68 Inches for the year 5.45 Inches below normal. The greatest deficiencies have occurred oc-curred In recent months. Precipitation for the 1938 calendar calen-dar year was 16.41 Inches, the bureau's bu-reau's record show. City water officials explained that rains on the higher ranges serve to pack present snow, freezing freez-ing Into Ice at nights. Improving the value of the snow as a source of late water next summer. Another storm from the northwest north-west Is approaching Utah, the weather bureau said. The mean temperature recorded was 44 degrees, de-grees, 15 above normal. In the past 24 hours Salt Lake City has received J5 Inch of rain, .13 Inch In the past 12 hour. . Roosevelt In eastern Utah, reported re-ported .67 Inch, while Wendover, In the west recorded .24 Inch during dur-ing the 12-hour period ended at 8 a. m. Delta and Greenriver reported re-ported no rain. Great Salt lake raised two Inches during December, starting a seasonal sea-sonal rise which ordinarily continues con-tinues until early summer, the Southern Pacific railroad announced an-nounced Tuesday. Measurements were taken by the section foreman at Midlske, a point on the Lucln cut-off. . . PreelpHatlea Lags Precipitation for the past year In Salt Lake City Is far below normal compared to the previous year. A comparative table, shown In Inches, follows: 1938 1939 Normal January 60. 1 28 1 31 February ... 1 15 1 96 1 51 March 4 11 1 06 1 98 April 1 78 . 92 2 05 May 2 09 1 12 1 92 June .53 1 31 .80 July 29 .11 .51 August .48 .26 .85 September .. .09 - .58 .98 October 1 61 1 42 1 44 November... 2 05 trace 135 December ... 1 63 66 1 43 Totals ....16 41 10 68 16 13 The precipitation year begins October Oc-tober 1. A comparison of the current cur-rent and past two precipitation years and normal follows, figures from the federal weather bureau office: 1937 1938 1939 Nor. October ... 2 63 1 61 1 42 1 44 November . .80 2 05 trace 1.35 December . 1 32 1 63 66 1 43 Totals .. 4 75 5 29 2 08 4 27 |