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A poor, rural community in Calfornia's agricultural belt has run out of water.

At least one California town has gone dry, and many are expected to follow soon. East Porterville, in Tulare County is now without water, as the wells that feed it have dried up. Residents, according to Yahoo! News, now have to drive to the local fire station to get water to drink, bathe, and flush the toilet. And ironically, the town is near what was once the largest freshwater lake in California.

Tulare County, which relies heavily on the agricultural industry, is parched. The some 500 wells that feed its residents and farmers have gone dry. And the county says that it may be years and cost $20 million before a new groundwater management program, which includes a hookup between East Porterville and Porterville's water systems, goes into effect.

The county is named for Tulare Lake, which was once the largest freshwater lake west of the Great Lakes. It was drained for regional agricultural purposes, begining in the early 20th Century. The lake basin is now some of the most fertile soil in the Central Valley, the most productive agricultural region of the United States. Although dry for the most part, the lake occasionally reappears after unusually high levels of rainfall or snow melt, the last time being 1997.

Earlier this month, a 5,000-gallon-water tank, donated by the county's Sheriff's Association was delivered to East Porterville, and that is primary source of water for this low-income community. Residents now drive to the fire department with empty water jugs and pump water from the tanks to take home. The county has also been supplying free bottled water, paid for by the state, to residents for drinking and cooking.

However, there are worries within the community that the county might use the bottled-water handout to identify undocumented residents or condemn homes that are in disrepair. Non-profit groups and churches have also been trying to help supply water to East Porterville residents.

"It's a disaster," says Andrew Lockman, manager of the Tulare County Office of Emergency Services. "It's not a tornado, it's not a hurricane, it's a quiet disaster."

In front of the local fire station, Pete Rodriguez stands next to his pick-up truck, filling about a dozen buckets from a vast tank.

He hurries, because another car is waiting behind him.

Rodriquez is one of hundreds of residents and business people in the small town of Porterville, in California's normally verdant Central Valley, who have no running water and are having to re-think how they live.

"I have two buckets near the toilet, one next to the shower," he told AFP.

Porterville, at the heart of what is known as America's food basket, is suffering from one of California's worst droughts in up to a century.

"In Tulare County we have at least 430 homes without running water because their water wells dried out," said Andrew Lockman, head of the county's emergency management center.

"I don't think there is a precedent in the state of California," he added, saying: "These people have no water for bathing, cooking, flushing toilets. It is a big public health issue."

Outside of the big towns, many homes in the region are dependent on water from private wells, which are now running dry after three years of drought which has exhausted underground water supplies, or aquifers.

In the long term the region needs structural change including a centralized water supply system. But that will take years and cost tens of millions of dollars to build.

In the meantime authorities can only offer stop-gap measures.

The governor of the Brazilian state of Sao Paulo has asked for emergency clearance to siphon the remaining water out of the main reservoir serving Sao Paulo city, which has almost run dry.

After nine months of unprecedented drought, 95% of the water has gone.

Geraldo Alckmin, re-elected in last week's elections, has been criticised for not imposing water rationing to tackle the crisis.

Twenty-nine other Brazilian cities have been affected by the drought.

Industry illegally injected about 3 billion gallons of fracking wastewater into central California drinking-water and farm-irrigation aquifers, the state found after the US Environmental Protection Agency ordered a review of possible contamination.

According to documents obtained by the Center for Biological Diversity, the California State Water Resources Board found that at least nine of the 11 hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, wastewater injection sites that were shut down in July upon suspicion of contamination were in fact riddled with toxic fluids used to unleash energy reserves deep underground. The aquifers, protected by state law and the federal Safe Water Drinking Act, supply quality water in a state currently suffering unprecedented drought.

The documents also show that the Central Valley Water Board found high levels of toxic chemicals - including arsenic, thallium, and nitrates - in water-supply wells near the wastewater-disposal sites.

Arsenic is a carcinogen that weakens the immune system, and thallium is a common component in rat poison.

"Arsenic and thallium are extremely dangerous chemicals," said Timothy Krantz, a professor of environmental studies at the University of Redlands, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

"The fact that high concentrations are showing up in multiple water wells close to wastewater injection sites raises major concerns about the health and safety of nearby residents."

Newly released images created from NASA satellite data illustrate the staggering effect the California drought has had on groundwater supply in the state. As Mashable's Patrick Kulp explains, the images show the amount of water lost over the past 12 years, with different colors indicating severity over time. "Nobody has any idea how disastrous it's going to be," Mike Wade of California Farm Water Coalition told the Associated Press, as RT reports a growing number of communities in central and northern California could end up without water in 60 days due to the Golden state's prolonged drought. While California is bearing the brunt, experts note "We're seeing it happening all over the world, in most of the major aquifers in the arid and semi-arid parts of the world."
Via Mashable,

California is currently experiencing the third year of one of the most severe short-term droughts ever recorded. Data from U.S. Drought Monitor shows that as of Sept. 30, 82% of the state is facing extreme or exceptional drought conditions.

But the state is not the only area being plagued by critical drops in groundwater reserves. Data collected by GRACE indicates that the supply of groundwater is in decline worldwide, especially in regions that rely on it most.

"We're seeing it happening all over the world. It's happening in most of the major aquifers in the arid and semi-arid parts of the world where we rely on those aquifers. But we're able to see now the impact we're having on this over exploitation," Famiglietti told Science Magazine.

The historic drought in the western United States has led to a surge of hungry black bears coming down from the Sierra Nevada in search of food.
Just this week, nine black bears were captured in the Lake Tahoe area in a two-day span, Nevada Department of Wildlife officials said Thursday. Two mother bears and three cubs were captured in Reno, Nev., while a sow and two cubs were corralled near Stateline. A 2-year-old bruin was caught near Carson City. A 10th was struck and killed by a car in Reno.

"Nothing much gets in the bear's way when they are this hungry," Carl Lackey, the agency's chief wildlife biologist, told the Associated Press. "Nature's dinner bell is ringing." According to officials, 42 black bears have been caught since July 1, and 40 were released back into the wild. Two repeat offenders had to be killed, the agency said; 10 were killed by cars.

The influx was expected. The drought, coupled with cooler temperatures, has resulted in the bears coming down from the foothills to scavenge residential areas for food in preparation for winter hibernation. According to Nevada Department of Wildlife spokesman Chris Healy, bears typically eat up to 25,000 calories a day - the equivalent of 83 McDonald's cheeseburgers, he said.

This week, scientists working on the GRACE mission released a series of images that reflect the drastic loss of groundwater over the last dozen years. The image on the left was taken in June 2002, just three months after GRACE was launched. The one in the middle was taken in June 2008, and the one on the right is from June 2014.

These are not satellite photographs. The colors indicate how much groundwater has been lost over time.
Worst hit, according to NASA, are the Sacramento River and San Joaquin River basins, where water has been pumped out to support agriculture in the Central Valley and elsewhere. Since 2011, the amount of water removed from these river basins each year added up to 4 trillion gallons. That's "an amount far greater than California's 38 million residents use in cities and homes annually," NASA noted.

U.S. Drought Monitor for California as of September 30, 2014:

The basin of Kazakhstan's Aral Sea, once the fourth largest lake in the world, is now completely dry. The history of the sea, which derived its name from a Kyrgyz word meaning "Sea of Islands," is revealed in a series of 10 videos.

California's water shortage has reached a critical stage.
At least a dozen communities in Northern and Central California are at risk of running out of water in just 60 days. The areas in jeopardy include Colusa and El Dorado County. These are relatively small communities and they rely on one source of water.

Butte County north of Sacramento is getting hit hard. At Big Bend Mobile Home Park near Oroville, home to more than 30 families, the water supply is so low that between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m., it is completely shut off.

"Hard when you have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night," said resident Michelle Payne. "I guess we're not flushing." The only water source for her entire community is a single well. There are other wells on the property, but they have all run dry.

"There's really nothing can you about it," said resident John Dougherty. "I don't water any plants... try to cut back on toilet usage... whatever we can do is what you gotta do...all we can do." "Pretty much anything that was alive weeks ago is dry, 'cuz we haven't been able to water," said Payne.

Some families have started driving five miles down the road to get drinking water from a spring box, for themselves and their animals.

Statewide the water shortages are getting worse. In just a month, the Water Resource Board's list of communities at risk of running out of water in 60 days has grown from 8 to 12. Big Bend Mobile Home Park made that list.