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CNN Live Today

Historic Drought Leaves Northeastern United States High & Dry

Aired April 22, 2002 - 10:51   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: The fragility of the environment is as evident as the dried lake beds and parched fields of the Northeast. A historic drought has the region in a stranglehold, and there are few signs that it won't relent anytime soon. Our environmental correspondent, Natalie Pawelski, has that story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NATALIE PAWELSKI, CNN ENVIRONMENTAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In a backyard in Pennsylvania, Mike Cochran drills another dry hole. He's trying to find a new source of water for a family whose well has run dry.

MIKE COCHRAN, A.C. REIDER DRILLING: Normally, we get one to two wells per day, somebody either has run out of water or a low-yielding well. This year so far, we've had as many as 16 in a single day.

PAWELSKI: Usually, Cochran says, he hits water on the first try. But with the Northeast suffering its worst drought in decades, finding water is getting harder. At a nearby lake, the drought has left acres of mud where water should be.

(on camera): A spring day at Codorus State Park, and this dock should be crowded with dozens of fishermen and boaters. But today, there's nobody here. Lake levels have dropped so low that the dock has been left high and dry.

(voice-over): The park's lake, which normally hosts more than a million visitors each summer, is down almost 15 feet.

ED KAUTZ, CODORUS STATE PARK: Basically, we haven't had any major rainfall since last June. And we're about halfway through the spring season when we normally are increasing our lake level, and we're still losing. So it's going to be a long summer if we don't get some major rainfall.

CHIEF DAVID GEMMILL, NEW BRIDGEVILLE FIRE COMPANY: This is our tank truck. What we do is this truck does nothing but haul water to the scene.

PAWELSKI: The drought is also a hot topic at the New Bridgeville Volunteer Fire Company. Firefighters here are responsible for a 64 square-mile territory that has only one fire hydrant. From the firefighters' point of view, the drought could be downright dangerous. GEMMILL: We normally have to draw water from streams and ponds and things of that nature. And with the drought conditions, the water in those reservoirs, the ponds and the streams, have declined greatly.

PAWELSKI: The water is too low in some places for the firefighters' pumps to function.

GEMMILL: I've never seen it quite this bad. Some of the older people in the community have said that this is a drastic situation, that they've not seen anything like this since like the 1930s.

PAWELSKI: Government forecasters say, at least for now, there's little relief in sight.

Natalie Pawelski, CNN, York County, Pennsylvania.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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