Stage 4 drought on Barton Springs not imminent this month, officials say

AUSTIN (KXAN) -- A move to Stage IV Exceptional Drought is no longer imminent, after the Barton Springs/Edwards Aquifer Conservation District found a discrepancy between direct flow data collected while assessing the drought, indicating low flow levels, according to officials.

The district, the City of Austin and the U.S. Geological Survey Oklahoma-Texas Water Science Center took manual measurements of the flow at Barton Creek Thursday morning, just below the pool, the general manager of the district said in an email.

"What we discovered is that there is a discrepancy between direct flow data collected today and flow that is derived from a statistical relationship with stage," the general manager said. "The latter is what the USGS gauge generates every 15 minutes. Apparently, at these low flows, the statistical relationship needs to be recalibrated and the new flow measurements generated by the stilling well can be validated with a few more manual measurements collected over time."

To measure Barton Springs flow, officials calculate the average water flow in cubic feet per second or cfs. The average water flow into the springs since 1978 is 68 cfs. At the end of July, the number dropped to 16 cfs, officials said. If the water flow drops even lower to 14 cfs, the district will declare Stage IV drought.

On Thursday, officials recalibrated the flow measurements and found that the actual flow from Barton Springs is a bit higher than the automated equipment showed -- more like 17 cubic ft./second instead of 12, the district said.