MASSIVE Western Drought Threatens Life As We Know & No One Is Talking About It! w/ Tony Heller (Jimmy Dore)

In this segment Jimmy shows a video documenting the catastrophic failure of the Colorado River system, noting that Hoover Dam has shut down for the first time in 90 years, Lake Mead has dropped to 953 feet—just three feet above the level where turbines die—and the Bureau of Reclamation has used the term "deadpool" for the first time, meaning the river could physically stop flowing through the dam by late summer. Guest Tony Heller explains that the 20th century was the wettest in 1,200 years, giving people "unrealistic expectations" about water availability in the Southwest, and that the current drought actually represents a return to the normal climate pattern, not an unprecedented crisis.

Heller also notes that the previous worst snowpack reading on record was 19% in 2002, but the current snowpack in critical zones above Lake Powell is 0%, and the spring runoff forecast is just 4% of average. He suggests that water from Flaming Gorge Reservoir is being moved to Lake Powell to mitigate the immediate crisis, and that an expected El Niño winter could bring significant snow to the Rockies and temporarily relieve the situation, but that long-term agriculture in the Imperial Valley and Yuma—which produce much of the nation's winter vegetables—may eventually need to relocate to Central or South America.



Remember there's data to indicate that California had two hundred year long droughts in the past.

[Posted at the SpookyWeather2 blog, May 21, 2026.]