The Current: 2026 water year in review

The Current: 2026 water year in review

Another water year has come and gone, and what a year it was. The 2026 water year started on Oct. 1, 2025 and came to an end on Sept. 30, 2026. As Colorado’s hottest and sixth driest water year on record, the Eagle River watershed found itself in the epicenter of a historically low snowpack and subsequent exceptional drought. A water year refers to the annual cycle that hydrologists use to track water. Since snow that falls after Oct. 1 tends to…