There's no doubt, the lake level on Lake Champlain is really low this year! It seems even more dramatic in contrast to last year's historic record high lake level when flood water inundated much of the shorelines.
This year is quite the different story. A rather snowless winter and dry spring and summer (so far) has allowed to lake water to evaporate away, bringing the level down to about 94.6 feet above sea level. Compare this to an average August lake level of 95.8 feet, and to last year's record when the lake swelled, nearly 7 feet higher than today, to over 103 feet above sea level.
The image on the left is the lake level climatology.
According to this climatology for the King Street Ferry Dock gauge in Burlington, the record lowest lake level for the month of August was 93.32' ASL. That means the lake would need to drop roughly another 15.6" (1 foot, 3.6 inches) to get to the record low for the month. The record low for all months was 92.61'. This would mean the lake would need to drop another 2 full feet to match that. Is it possible to reach the record low? Sure, its possible. If we didn't get much rain at all through the next few months, the lake could certainly drop at a quick rate. With nearly 2" of rain recently fallen in at least the Burlington area rain gauge for the past 10 days (plus an other near lake rainfall) the lake level has been rather steady.
Fox44/ABC22's David Hodges did a great story on the lake on Friday. View that video above.
