Daniel Swain in The Los Angeles Times: Unusually warm May contributes to expanding drought in the West

One factor in the expanding drought is the fact that May 2020 was the fifth-warmest May on record. This probably exacerbated the dryness and contributed to a number of wildfires, according to the Drought Monitor’s summary. UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain points out, there are already hints of the next big heatwave on the horizon for the last 10 days of June.