There are scientific studies that cause Internet firestorms of panic when the results are publicized in on line journals. The idea of a mega river that will land on California and create monster flooding is all the buzz today. But there is no call for panic, it is all based on a model that was run by the USGS.
Many weather scientists, including Ken Clark, a Western US blogger for Accuweather, are neither happy with the atmospheric river headlines and buzz, nor are they happy with conclusions that such an event is imminent or should cause panic.
One of the sources is a New York Times article where the USGS announced that a mega storm that has not happened for over 150 years could happen again and convened a conference to start some disaster planning. This storm could last for over a month, could dump 10 feet of water on California’s central valley or south land, creating massive flooding, landslides and destruction of life and property.
It has happened in the past, according to historical accounts or evidence of giant storms that occurred in the years 200, 212, 440, 603, 1029, 1418,1605 and 1815.
The current excitement involves a test that was done with worst case parameters set at 40 days duration, 135 MPH winds and the equivalent of 60 Mississippi Rivers worth of water. The scientists at the USGS set the system to show what would happen with such a catastrophic storm. The scientists referred to past events of that nature to conclude that it will happen again.
Add in the changing nature of the climate which is leading to spectacular and violent storm activity all over the world and it becomes clear that California is as vulnerable as, say, Australia.
The type of storm that would cause this is called an Atmospheric River, which California gets almost every year in the form of the “Pineapple Express”. Atmospheric rivers come when storms are capable of picking up enormous volumes of water from the warmer oceans, then carrying them for thousands of miles. When the mass of water, powered by a powerful storm engine, hits land, the water is released.
California’s Pineapple Express generally originates in the Hawaii area and can contain the volume of an entire river. California’s monster atmospheric rivers of the past have contained the equivalent of many Mississippi rivers. The model that was run this year was set at a volume of 60 Mississippi rivers, winds of up to 135 MPH and a duration of 40 days.
As an example, In 2010, an unusually large atmospheric river came from much farther west than Hawaii and hit California as described in a summary by Dr Greg Forbes of the The Weather Channel.
The reason that California natives had never heard of Pineapple expresses or atmospheric rivers until recently is because no technology existed to identify them. With the deployment of advanced NASA MODIS satellites and Earth based weather and atmospheric monitoring systems, atmospheric rivers have been identified and photographed from space. Before that, Californians and scientists could only recall that there were some very bad and very wet storms.
It only follows that the USGS would convene a disaster preparedness conference in order to work with FEMA and other government agencies to develop plans and budgeting for a response should such an event occur. The model, real atmospheric change and past events make it possible that a mega atmospheric river phenomenon will happen again in California and other parts of the world.
The Australia flooding and other events all over the globe are proof that some form of preparation and disaster planning are in order. Also, the conference will result in better disaster support planning should assistance be required in other parts of the world where atmospheric rivers have been known to occur.
