The driest spring on record

Warm to begin with, then changeable, followed by cold weather, and finally hot – yet GeoSphere Austria’s preliminary climate assessment of the meteorological spring of 2026 reveals an all-time low: between 1 March and 31 May, Austria has never before experienced such a drought in its 169-year history of weather records. Precipitation deficits reached up to 80 per cent.

One has to go back a very long way in the time series to find spring months with similarly low rainfall. In 1865 and 1946, the deviation from the 1991–2020 climate average was minus 41 per cent in each case. In spring 2026, the figure was minus 50 per cent. And this was not just in certain regions of Austria, but across the board. This massive deficit is the result of three extremely dry months. Precipitation was 58 per cent lower in March, 68 per cent lower in April and 33 per cent lower in May. ‘What’s more, the previous winter had also brought significantly too little rainfall,’ adds climatologist Alexander Orlik from GeoSphere Austria. ‘This led to a significant worsening of the prevailing drought. In some regions, it did rain on and off in May, which alleviated the situation in the upper soil layers for the time being.’

However, it was not just the regional average that made this the driest spring on record. Individual weather stations with long time series have also recorded new negative records for spring rainfall totals. These include Lienz in East Tyrol, where measurements have been taken since 1854, and Ried im Innkreis (since 1872). The Innviertel – together with the neighbouring Flachgau – was the driest region in the state. Precipitation there was up to 80 per cent below the 1991–2020 average. The figure was up to 65 per cent in the Mühl- and Waldviertel, Upper Styria, the rest of Salzburg, East Tyrol and Upper Carinthia.

In terms of temperature, spring was a mixed bag. The first two weeks of March were significantly too warm, but then, towards the end of the month, a cold snap caused temperatures to drop, particularly in western Austria and in the mountains. The Ice Saints in May also brought a noticeable cooling to Austria. After that, however, temperatures soared. New temperature records for May were recorded at a total of 20 GeoSphere Austria weather stations that have been in operation for more than 40 years: in Lienz, where measurements have been taken since 1931, the existing record high from 2009 was exceeded by 1.1 degrees on 26 May, with a reading of 33.3 degrees. Compared with the 1991–2020 climate average, the meteorological spring of 2026 was 1.2 degrees too warm. Compared with the 1961–1990 climate average, it was 2.7 degrees. Incidentally, it was 33.3 degrees on 26 May not only in Lienz, but also in Haiming (Tyrol). It was 48.3 degrees cooler – namely minus 15 degrees – on 28 March in Lech am Arlberg. Nowhere else in Austria was it so cold in a populated area during the spring of 2026.

Spring 2026 saw a 15 per cent increase in sunshine. This was due to high-pressure weather systems, which resulted in very little cloud cover. Deviations in sunshine duration from the 1991–2020 climate average of more than 30 per cent were recorded in Vorarlberg and the Außerfern region, as well as in Flachgau, Upper Austria and western Lower Austria. The sunniest place in Austria between 1 March and 31 May was Podersdorf on Lake Neusiedl, with 755 hours of sunshine. The greatest deviation from the long-term average was recorded at the Wachtberg/Steyr weather station. 646 hours of sunshine were recorded, corresponding to an increase of 29 per cent.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)