Role of soil moisture in maintaining droughts

The influence of soil moisture on the persistence of an ongoing drought was investigated. The case study of drought of the summer of 1980 was selected. The difference in the simulation of two identical twin runs: one with the climatological normal soil moisture and the other with anomalous soil moisture for drought conditions, were examined on the mean monthly circulation. It is found that a reduction in soil moisture did produce a corresponding reduction in precipitation. The pattern of the rainfall anomaly however, was not identical to the soil moisture (evapotranspiration) anomaly but had a good resemblance with observations.