VERMILION PARISH, La. (KLFY) -- According to the drought monitor, Louisiana is experiencing its most widespread drought in more than two decades.

News 10 spoke with Abbeville Fire Department Jude Mire about the Vermilion Parish's struggle with the drought.

"Where they had that plane crash when that Entergy wire hit the ground. I mean, that's a good example of what can happen. You know, just the electrical wire falling down started that field fire, and my guys had to wait until the electrical line was de-energized so that they could finally put out the fire," said Mire.

Mire says with the burn ban in place, the fire department and law enforcement have been monitoring if residents are following the law.

"We have a lot of people calling us, you know, they just want to do bonfires or this or that. We're telling them no because when you're so far behind on the rain, the ground is still so dry even when we had a little bit of rain," Mire said.

The burn ban is in place because of the severe drought in the bayou state. In fact, Storm Team 10 meteorologist Chris Cozart spoke about just how large the drought is in the state. He says it's one of the worst since 2011.

"We only picked up 35.87 inches of rainfall here in Lafayette. So we're below that right now. We could actually be in one of the top five driest years on record because unfortunately, over the next two to three weeks, everything looks very dry across Acadiana, and unless we have something significant in the way of rainfall in the next 1 to 2 months, I think we're going to be in one of those top five driest years on record for Lafayette," said Cozart.

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