The occasional shower didn’t do enough to stem the increasing rates of drought and abnormal dryness across Missouri.

The most recent US Drought Monitor, released Thursday, now shows 93.7 percent of the state in drought or abnormal dryness, an increase of 32.7 percentage points from last week. All of the KMMO listening area is now in some stage of dryness. Of note, all of Benton County is among the 30.7 percent of the state that is in moderate drought, the first stage of drought conditions. No part of the state has fallen into severe, the next level of drought.