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Historic, Widespread Flooding Will Continue Through May, NOAA Says (cnn.com)

The U.S. is likely to see "historic, widespread flooding" through May, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association's spring outlook. From a report: "This is shaping up to be a potentially unprecedented flood season, with more than 200 million people at risk for flooding in their communities," said Ed Clark, director of NOAA's National Water Center in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. NOAA's outlook calls for nearly two-thirds of the lower 48 states to face an elevated risk of flooding through May, with the potential for major to moderate flooding in 25 states across the Great Plains, Midwest and down through the Mississippi River valley.

"The flooding this year could be worse than what we have seen in previous years ... even worse than the historic floods we saw in 1993 and 2011," said Mary Erickson, deputy director of the National Weather Service. The warning comes amid record flooding triggered by a sudden warm-up and heavy rains earlier this month brought on by the "bomb cyclone." Combined with rapid snowmelt, the factors in recent weeks have put many places in the Great Plains and Midwest underwater.

113 comments

  1. Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    n/m

    1. Re:Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Isn't everything "Historic" in the media lately? Must be the new catch word.

    2. Re:Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      I think most people would consider 1000-year floods to be historic.

    3. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      liberal media trying to convince you some minor rain is the end of the world unless we raise taxes 9448%

    4. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Except the whole idea of a "once in an N year flood" isnt based on observation as to actual chance, but guessed chance.

      It doesnt mean you should go N years without one, it means every year there is a guessed 1/N chance of one... and sometimes the people doing the predicting are wrong, othertimes you just are unlucky.

    5. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      liberal media trying to convince you some minor rain is the end of the world unless we raise taxes 9448%

      Huh I thought raising taxes magically changed the climate.

    6. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Let no flood go unused. Sail 100,000 Trotsky-sluts warmist bitches down the Mississippi in bamboo kayaks & into the gaping jaws of Alabama crocs. Chompchompchomp ... how does ANTIFA scream ? Loudly !! ...hehehe ...

    7. Re:Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, they don't remember the floods of '57 or the most destructive tornado in history in '25.

      They use catch words to make the sheep think there is nothing but doom and gloom in the future because they hide the past.

      Don't listen to the news, it is mostly fake or misleading anyway.

      Don't applaud throw money!

    8. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Climate scientists have been telling us about these extreme weather patterns for a while now....... and it will cost us in damages.

      Politics and science are two different fields gentlemen.

    9. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It isn't the TV spouting doom and gloom, it's thousands of global scientists with doctorates and decades of professional experience. ...but I'm sure you know better than all of them. They must be camping in Antarctica because it's fun.

    10. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It does. By strangling growth, water vapor emissions are cut leading very quickly to cooling, especially around cities. Over time, factors favoring increased humidity over increased ground moisture (less paving, less irrigation, fewer cooling towers, in addition to the quicker response of less combustion) lead to further cooling.

      All it takes is mass genocide of the human race and we can all live like happy little primitives murdering each other over glass beads for the next 10,000 years until natural climatic variance finishes us off.

    11. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Less accurately than horoscopes.

    12. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, raising taxes balances the budget to pay the existing bills.

      In an unrelated note, maybe more natural disasters back to back will wake up the mid west to the existence of climate change. I'll get my popcorn, should be a good show with houses underwater.

    13. Re: Time to build NOAA's Ark by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'll take those indescript two-digit years to be in 1900's. The industrial revolution started two centuries before that with smoke stacks. Climate change is coming to a head after centuries of pollution. Events in the mid 1900's can still be correlated.

  2. Frosty by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    Q: What did c6gunner say when he found some earth in his rice?
    A: It's pliau terra!

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    1. Re: Frosty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Stay in a hotel

  3. Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Jzanu · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Flooding due to early snow melting (when other water occupies the drainage basins). Higher temperatures sooner in the year causing earlier melting. What drives higher temperatures in abnormal patterns compared to records? What drives new and old water into areas different than previously used as drainage?

    These events are occurring because global warming and increased human development press on the environment at the same time. Both pressures are at fault, and have a common cause as both are driven by faster development than is supportable in the ecosystem.

    1. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Tough break for those farmers who voted for Trump.

      First he breaks their balls with an idiotic trade war, then he diverts funding from FEMA for his wall. And of course he doesn't give a rat's ass about climate change, so that's the cherry on top.

      Reap what you sow, mid-westerners

    2. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Flooding due to early snow melting (when other water occupies the drainage basins).

      Higher temperatures sooner in the year causing earlier melting.

      What drives higher temperatures in abnormal patterns compared to records?

      What drives new and old water into areas different than previously used as drainage?

      These events are occurring because global warming and increased human development press on the environment at the same time. Both pressures are at fault, and have a common cause as both are driven by faster development than is supportable in the ecosystem.

      So what are you going to do about it? How are you making a difference?

    3. Re: Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's called spring

    4. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Vaccines!

    5. Re: Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      We all reap what they sow.

    6. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yet people keep telling me weather != climate.

      Flooding happens all the time in the mid-west. Usually they get a decent sized one every ~10 years. Where I grew up they actually planned for it. With huge water control lakes. They are very nice during the summer full of cool water. I remember the flooding of the 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, etc...

      You may have also missed the mid-west is flat and have well above average snow falls since November after about 10 years of bellow average.

      The problem is the dumbasses who somehow think floods will not affect them and build in those *planned* flood plains.

      Mark my words. In about a month when cali gets is usual flooding we get to hear the same story.

      Maybe we can pay more taxes. That will be SURE to fix the issue. Yeah lets do that!

    7. Re: Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      someone doesn't understand the meaning of the word "historic", hahahaha

    8. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, it's just the normal historic flooding. Dumbass.

    9. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nothing you said is backed by any scientific fact. All you are using is conjecture.

    10. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It would be great to search all the past discussions on climate change and find all the conservatives you said the increased precipitation caused by climate change would overall be a good thing.

    11. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      tl;dr: ORANGE MAN BAD.

      t. NPC

    12. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Flooding due to early snow melting (when other water occupies the drainage basins).

      Higher temperatures sooner in the year causing earlier melting.

      What drives higher temperatures in abnormal patterns compared to records?

      What drives new and old water into areas different than previously used as drainage?

      These events are occurring because global warming and increased human development press on the environment at the same time. Both pressures are at fault, and have a common cause as both are driven by faster development than is supportable in the ecosystem.

      Wait, where's the "local weather is completely irrelevant in global climate studies" crowd? Oh, right, apparently they only come out of the woodworks when the local weather seems to disprove global warming. Screaming "ZOMGWTFBBQ THIS CONCLUSIVELY PROVES GLOBAL WARMING" is still acceptable when it goes the other way.

    13. Re:Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by sexconker · · Score: 2

      I remember watching the HUGE HISTORIC floods on TV at my grandparents house in the midwest twice in my childhood, about a decade apart.
      As a teenager I remembered thinking "This is the same thing that happened before, why are they acting like it's some unprecedented event?".

    14. Re: Easy Puzzle with Scientific Thinking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Stop conflating higher taxes with anything other than simply paying the existing bills on the books. We have a yearly deficit; which adds to the debt. In countries like Australia, a bill is not passed unless the funding for the bill is secured. Only in the U.S. do we sign a bill into law and then refuse to collect enough money to pay for it.

  4. What higher temperatures by SuperKendall · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Higher temperatures sooner in the year causing earlier melting.

    In Colorado we've had record low temperatures for February.

    A trend which carried on in March

    Where do you think much of the snowpack is, hmm...

    Maybe flooding is due to more moisture?? Like, say from a rare event that dropped a lot more moisture across a wide region than normal??

    Nah, can't be! Has to be the mythical Spaghetti Monster vibrating the atmosphere to shake out all the water!

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Its all just physics, which does and cannot have a bias nor agenda.

    2. Re:What higher temperatures by sobachatina · · Score: 0

      Yes. It is just physics. But the physics of the thing are that it is raining. Not very useful.

      The people who conjecture *why* it's raining and whether it's likely to rain more in the future *do* have bias and sometimes even an agenda.

    3. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A couple days of record cold does not alter the fact that average temperatures are higher.

    4. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you are retarded

    5. Re:What higher temperatures by DRJlaw · · Score: 4, Informative

      In Colorado we've had record low temperatures for February.

      No, you had record cold temperatures in February -- you ignore the other days mentioned in your own article:

      The cold snap came amid a wild, roller coaster swing. Denver had a high temperature of 69 degrees on Sunday, and then the temperature dropped to a low of minus 3 degrees at 6:45 a.m. Tuesday. The 72-degree swing is the 13th widest on record, spanning 147 years, in Denver in a 36- to 48-hour time range, according to the weather service.

      Similarly

      A trend which carried on in March

      Two days, again according to your own article.

      Your February wasn't even in your top 20 coldest Februarys, so it's hard to see what trend carried into March.

      Maybe flooding is due to more moisture?? Like, say from a rare event that dropped a lot more moisture across a wide region than normal??

      Funny how those rare events keep increasing in frequency.

    6. Re:What higher temperatures by youngone · · Score: 0, Troll

      What about the people who claim climate change is not a thing?
      Or, hang on, yes the climate is changing, but not because of human activity.
      Why would someone spend $400 million trying to influence voters if they didn't expect a return?
      But OK, "Big Science" is the problem, sure.

    7. Re:What higher temperatures by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Higher temperatures sooner in the year causing earlier melting.

      In Colorado we've had record low temperatures for February.

      A trend which carried on in March

      It may surprise you to learn that after things get cold in an area that they then get warmer which causes all that snow to melt. The increasingly extreme weather and weather fluctuations are indicative of Climate Change.

      It's not a coincidence that all these "rare weather events" are becoming increasingly common because they are part of the larger pattern that is Climate Change.

      --
      Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
    8. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are a fucking moron.

    9. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Eh, according to the NOAA, Colorado had one of the colder Februaries on record. Not the top 20, but in the top 30ish out of 125.

      Other states had close to their coldest on record. Interestingly, the south east was experiencing record warm temperatures.

    10. Re:What higher temperatures by rtb61 · · Score: 4, Informative

      The new weather pattern. A warmer pacific ocean is generating a new air flow pattern, with more warmer air rushing up the US West Coast and the Pacific, pushing further North than was the old pattern. This warmer air is picking up a lot of moisture as it is cooling and heating up Alaska and the Arctic accelerating ice melt and picking up that newly available water, it then has to go somewhere, so it would normally go a bit more south east but it is being blocked by a warmer Atlantic and air moving north. So it gets squeezed between the pacific air flow and the Atlantic airflow and now goes much further south pushing cold air and a whole lot of moisture, in the form of snow.

      Once that now routine weather pattern is over, warm air comes it to replace that cold air as it is pushed out over the Atlantic, and melts all the snow, really quite fast, well the further south snow, more north not so fast, so lots of flooding further south because the snow melts a whole lot faster than previous regular patterns and flooding occurs.

      Suck it up, this is the new norm, and combined with sea level rise it will really be quite bad for the US East Coast, catastrophic is no understatement. Altered water levels really screw up building footings, storm water and sewer system. You can imagine the worth of a coastline full of flooded out collapsing structures and a lot of US military bases on the east coast are on really low lying land. Then you have sea ports and airports, again on low lying land (it was cheaper) also in real trouble.

      Too late to do much about the first say 1.5m of sea level rise, maybe keep it down to 750mm but that will take real action now. The safest economic measure, simple irrigate large swathes of Australia west coast desert, pumping desalinated water inland. You obviously pull that water out of the sea, so immediate benefit but in addition, green where it was red, cools the surface of the planet at lot, then of course the new planting would absorb lots of carbon dioxide and plant transpiration cycle also cools the atmosphere and for the cheery on top, the majority of that transpiration would fall as rain on inland Australia which is lower than sea level. The more you do that and the quicker you do it, the more it will reduce the impact of climate change and it in part pays for itself with a massive social benefit, tens of thousands of square kilometres planetary food and fibre bank (trees, hemp etc). Countries could invest in desalination in resources they could directly access, especially worth while for countries with limited land area, access to thousands of sqaure kilometres of land as long as they supply the desalinate irrigation to that land.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    11. Re:What higher temperatures by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      The article expects temperatures to remain cooler than average across the region, but with higher than average rainfall.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    12. Re: What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just like australia has had record low temps the past couple months, huh? Oh wait,
      https://weather.com/news/news/2019-01-16-australia-heat-wave-hottest-days-on-record
      How is it so hard for people to understand what average means? And I have yet to see a convincing argument on why "big science" supposedly makes up numbers on global warming. Anyone care to enlighten me?

    13. Re: What higher temperatures by Thelaststraw · · Score: 1

      @ SuperKendall, not sure why I providing facts as you'll choose to ignore them, but here is one stat, I will reply with more as I get info. http://www.stormfax.com/huryea...

      --
      Nothing to see here, move along please.
    14. Re: What higher temperatures by Thelaststraw · · Score: 1

      @ SuperKendall, not sure why I providing facts as you'll choose to ignore them, but here is one stat, I will reply with more as I get info. http://www.stormfax.com/huryea...

      --
      Nothing to see here, move along please.
    15. Re: What higher temperatures by Thelaststraw · · Score: 1
      --
      Nothing to see here, move along please.
    16. Re: What higher temperatures by Thelaststraw · · Score: 2

      It has gotten so bad, even the oil companies have fessed up. https://corporate.exxonmobil.c...

      --
      Nothing to see here, move along please.
    17. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This word salad was modded "Interesting."

    18. Re:What higher temperatures by DRJlaw · · Score: 3, Informative

      It carried on a lot longer than that, according to LIVING HERE.

      We can see the temperatures ourselves, moron. Two days. Three if you want to pretend that 28 F is some sort of barn-burning cold. Only four days that didn't go above 32.

      It's only a few days after the bomb cyclone we've started actually approaching average temperatures.

      Own-goal. March 3rd to March 7th is indeed a "few days" from bomb cyclone to average high temperature. Also, not something that supports your point.

      So how do we have more melting that normal with below average tertmpetures?

      You misspelled "temperatures." I'd let it slide, but you have a spelling fetish it seems. How do you have more melting? Something about greater snowpack, which you admit, and daytime temperatures routinely above freezing, which we can see for ourselves. But wait, it gets better, because for some reason you want to only talk about Denver.

      You can dance around it all you like, but the fact is you and your scientifically, data starved ignorant friends are simply wrong about what is happening now, and you base your forecasts on this fundamentally mistaken view of the world... sad.

      You're appearing to confuse Denver with the predicted flooding areas, and then the world.

      You can't locate Denver on a map. SAD. The rest of us can. It's in one of those square states full of white.

      You misspelled decreasing. Just like a climate alarmists to confuse weather for climate.

      No, I really didn't.

      Pretty telling that I am the only one providing real data while you try to spread fear and panic by totally ignoring what the weather is actually doing.

      You can't click on a hyperlink to NWS temperatures? SAD.
      You should try clicking on these links. But you won't. SAD.
      You think that I have the sole responsibility to provide "real data" that is being published constantly yet you actively ignore? SAD.

      I'll let you have the last response, since at this point everyone is onto your game of deception... everyone except for you it would seem.

      You won't. You'll come back and post some nonsense, including that fact that "everyone" (except for every single reply to your post) agrees with your delusional position.

    19. Re:What higher temperatures by DRJlaw · · Score: 1

      Eh, according to the NOAA, Colorado had one of the colder Februaries on record. Not the top 20, but in the top 30ish out of 125

      Not what your weatherman means if he says says "record cold for February," now is it?

    20. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I dunno, it's an audacious plan but I like it. Were I in a position to do so, I'd execute it.

    21. Re:What higher temperatures by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...pumping desalinated water inland.

      BAHAHAHA! And just how will all that water be desalinated? Where will you get all that energy from? From coal plants? Oh wait, let me guess, you'll use all that abundant wind and solar to do the trick eh? And where will the windmills and solar panels come from? Thin air? No, they'll be built using materials mined from the earth-- and those mining machines will be powered with what? Diesel. And the strip mines will dump their tailings where? Will those tailings be saturated with mercury, lead, arsenic etc?

      And what about all the precious reefs that will be destroyed as the construction crews build inlet pipes for the desalination plants?
      And what about all the wildlife that was in the desert that you hope to destroy?

      Put this in perspective, what's worse: a few feet of gradual sea level rise or a helter-skelter dash to desalinate huge amounts of sea water and pump it inland in a vain uphill battle to turn a desert green?
      You virtue signal about saving the environment and yet you propose to do precisely that to a desert! Is a desert that has been there for thousands of years less natural than a man-made oasis?

      This is why people don't take you tree huggers seriously.

  5. Historic? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Isn't _all_ extensive flooding historic? And then there's the truly historic Mississippi flooding of 1993!!

    1. Re: Historic? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Contractors all over the place are updating their budgets with extra work replacing basement paneling

    2. Re: Historic? by Cmdln+Daco · · Score: 1

      Star Wars collectables nationwide are saying 'Oh no! Oh no!' in their basement display cases as owners ignore them and continue to frequent Marvel movies.

  6. Better infrastructure policy? by Picodon · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So what are you going to do about it? How are you making a difference?

    How about better infrastructure policy, for starters? (Policy that would take into account realistic forecasts of climate evolution, in particular.)

    The many levee breaches make me think that we are not focussing on raising the right walls, at this point in time.

    1. Re:Better infrastructure policy? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

      So what are you going to do about it? How are you making a difference?

      How about better infrastructure policy, for starters? (Policy that would take into account realistic forecasts of climate evolution, in particular.)

      The many levee breaches make me think that we are not focussing on raising the right walls, at this point in time.

      the only "better infrastructure" this country will see for decades is improvements to Trump properties

  7. Fake News! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    Climate chaos is hitting GOP strongholds hard. But don't worry, its a hoax. Your cattle didn't drown. You never had any cattle. Your bridges aren't washed out and your roads aren't covered in 5 feet of mud, there were never any bridge, there never were any roads. Its all lies from libtards. YOU aren't even real, you are just a hoax to trick Real Americans into paying for scheming scientists to live lavish lifestyles.

    1. Re:Fake News! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      LOL at the impotent downvoter. I'm sure it feels really affirming. Good luck downvoting reality though.

  8. How to not get flooded by Seven+Spirals · · Score: 2

    Step 1: "When was the last time this place flooded?"
    Step 2: "Oh, it has flooded before? Thanks. I'm not interested in the property."

    1. Re:How to not get flooded by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Step 1: "When was the last time this place flooded?"

      Step 2: "Oh, it has flooded before? Thanks. I'm not interested in the property."

      good luck buying property anywhere, there is not a square inch on this entire planet that has not been underwater in the past.

    2. Re:How to not get flooded by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      LOL. There are plenty of hilly areas in the world where you can be hundreds of feet above any possible flood level as long as you don't insist building close to the water. Uphill land tends to be cheaper too. It's just that people want to live next to water.

    3. Re:How to not get flooded by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      It's a damned shame that cities keep permitting people to build on flood land just because it supports their tax base. We have permitting systems in place specifically to avoid things like this, but instead we use them to keep "undesirables" out.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    4. Re:How to not get flooded by Cmdln+Daco · · Score: 1

      The water has a nice way of obliging them.

    5. Re:How to not get flooded by dryeo · · Score: 1

      Funny enough, the undesirables used to be forced to live on the floodplains here. No government help back then so rich people stuck to the higher ground.

      --
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
    6. Re:How to not get flooded by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That logic used to work when 100 year floods didn't happen once a decade.

    7. Re:How to not get flooded by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Some places are plainly better than others. When I bought my place, there was the standard flood disclaimer in all the closing documents and we chuckled over that because I'm about 250 ft. above lake level. It would be unprecedented for our lake to rise 10 ft. above average. Meanwhile, there are people that live right by the lake, or near creeks that feed into it and *duh*, they get flooded. I guess I could worry about landslides, which are kind of like floods but FIRE is our no. 1 concern with earthquakes, slides and wind storms way distant behind that. Every place has something.

    8. Re:How to not get flooded by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Step 2: "Oh, it has flooded before? Thanks. I'm not interested in the property."

      May I interest you in a really big boat? Lots of space to store animals.

    9. Re:How to not get flooded by houghi · · Score: 1

      Stupid Dutch.

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
    10. Re:How to not get flooded by Cro+Magnon · · Score: 2

      The last time my area was underwater, there was a plesiosaur swimming in it.

      --
      Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
    11. Re:How to not get flooded by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Our home has never flooded before and was considered completely flood proof. In fact, our entire neighborhood was considered flood proof. We're at the top of the largest hill in the are, with the river bottom portion of the city several hundred feet below us.

      We had a LONG cold streak. For more than a month temperatures were well below freezing with near unprecedented snow. Which lead to huge piles of snow along roadways and driveways. Even though the snow started as fluffy and light due to the cold, it would pack down creating ice dams all along these roads and driveways. And when we suddenly swung from barely breaking zero degrees farenheight, to the forties AND got nearly ten inches of rain on that same day? The fluffy snow up top melted, but the ice dams remained. And we, along with many of our neighbors, were flooded. The water built up in the road and flowed across driveways directly into our homes. The poor folks in the river bottoms may lose their homes this year. We were lucky. We just get to clean up our floors, throw out some soaked carpet, and bleach our concrete.

      If this is a one year phenomenon? Random chance.

      If this is a new pattern, and it begins to happen year after year? We're all fucked.

    12. Re:How to not get flooded by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      And now there is government help, but the help doesn't require people to relocate if they get it, and that's horribly misguided. People should either be able to stay where they are and have to do it all themselves, or get a hand up off the flood plain. I'm all for helping people, but you don't let the drowning man pull you under. You knock him the hell out if you have to.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    13. Re:How to not get flooded by Outta_the_way_peck! · · Score: 1

      The do have to relocate, or at least raise, their homes. The issue is that flood zone maps only came about in the 80's and the pre-existing structures were grandfathered. However, when the cumulative repairs/improvements to those buildings eclipses half the value of the property, it now has to be brought within compliance with the flood zone restrictions. That is why flood zone properties are constantly being bought back and left vacant by state/county/city governments after every flood. The bigger issue with new construction is failure to understand the implications it has to flooding when not directly building in the flood zone. Building new or higher levees, while perhaps protecting that area, only pushes the problem downstream as the water will be forced there faster instead of spreading out in the now cutoff floodplain.

  9. Climate change impacts cost Trillions by WillAffleckUW · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Every year you put off implementing things to reduce climate change, the costs multiply many fold.

    What were once once a century storms and floods are now every 2-3 years.

    What were once massive inundations and beetle infestation wildfires are now commonplace.

    Even zoning codes have to change, to allow for redesign of buildings to survive such events every year or two, which increases building costs on average 50 percent and requires redesign of existing towns and buildings.

    Energy goes in.

    It comes out somewhere. It's like putting a bucket of bees inside. We can't tell you where the bees will sting or when, but we know there are going to be a lot of stings and consequences.

    Oh, and stop building on flood plains and lowlands and using levees. We're beyond that now. You waited too long.

    --
    -- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
    1. Re:Climate change impacts cost Trillions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      the world is warming faster than it has ever before guess why? Chemistry that we are actively using and whose products really last thousands of years so everything ever done in industry is all building up and getting worse by the second

    2. Re:Climate change impacts cost Trillions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I know this is going to be a shocking revelation, but the planet's climate has always been in a changing state. The problem is that climate changes span longer periods of time than the time frame in which humans have been capable of collecting usable data. The most reliable source on the entire planet (/s for idiots who can't spot sarcasm), Wikipedia, Notably, we've been in a period of cooling for several thousand years and large jumps and drops for "short" time frames (years, not centuries) are not unusual; in fact, multiple ice cores show several large oscillations over multiple millennia.

      How long have we been collecting real-time climate data again? Oh yeah, since 1880, or just under 140 years. Not even a blip on the goddamn radar. And "the science is settled!" retards wonder how people can be skeptical. It'd be a shame if the actual data disagreed with them...which it does.

    3. Re:Climate change impacts cost Trillions by phantomfive · · Score: 2

      What were once once a century storms and floods are now every 2-3 years.

      All you need is 100 independent regions and you'll have a once in a century event every year.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    4. Re:Climate change impacts cost Trillions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oohh... 'climate change'... scary...

      There is no such thing as 'catastrophic man-made global warming', which is why they renamed it 'climate change'.

      www.climatedepot.com
      www.wattsupwiththat.com

    5. Re:Climate change impacts cost Trillions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Current evidence is that the earth is entering a cooling cycle. The SJWs are a little slow on the uptake. Well you know all those Women's Studies, Pyschology, Afro Studies, and Intesectional Studies majors aren't very good at physics, math, or lab work. That stuff is hard! I'm not going to get my science from a Women's Studies major.

    6. Re:Climate change impacts cost Trillions by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      All you need is 100 independent regions and you'll have a once in a century event every year.

      It's become common for regions to have new records every few years of late, and the globe has had two hottest years in recorded history in what, the last decade?

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    7. Re: Climate change impacts cost Trillions by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      So what?

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    8. Re: Climate change impacts cost Trillions by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      So these events aren't 100-year events (or what have you) any more.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  10. what an idiot you are by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oh, and stop building on flood plains and lowlands and using levees. We're beyond that now. You waited too long.

    you are even stupider than the people you think are stupid, because you think you can take sense into them. Maybe you also think you can make rocks smarter by talking to them?

    1. Re: what an idiot you are by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's pretty much what computing is.

    2. Re: what an idiot you are by WillAffleckUW · · Score: 1

      Remember the sleestax in Land of the Lost? We use glowing rocks to compute.

      --
      -- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
  11. Noah by AndrewFlagg · · Score: 2

    when did Noah build the ark? before the rain? i feel bad for the flooding areas, but hey, i have seen realtors sell a ton of things in a flood plain knowing better than to do that.. insurance companies just jack the rates up, and of course our government just bails our the insurance companies over and over again using taxpayer backed funds for stupid development and redevelopment on the coast and in under water table and levy housing that should have never existed after the first major catastrophe and flood... should have been made and remained a soccer field park or something like that forever...

    1. Re:Noah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, where do you live? In my country flood insurance is a MASSIVE extra on normal housing insurance. If you're in the flood plain, it's damn near impossible to get it at all. And even if you do get it, the insurance companies are still allowed to call it an "act of god" if they just don't feel like paying out.

    2. Re:Noah by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      An insurance payment for a flood-damaged home should come with a relocation requirement, and replacement should not be on any other flood plain, either.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  12. Nope. Wrong again. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Calculated. YOU may do your "work" based on guesswork and pulling out your arse, but professionals do not.

    1. Re:Nope. Wrong again. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A) How can I be wrong again when this is my first post to this article?

      B) Citation needed.

      At last check, science is about predictability and reproducibility.

      Normally, when 'professionals' find that their theories/models are wrong compared to observed results, those involved attempt to better understand what is wrong with the existing theory/model and change it to better explain observed behavior.

      This is a bit of a problem when talking about "1 in an N year flood" as good records of the last N don't always exist with the degree of detail desired/required.

      We've been hearing for a couple generations now that we only have ~a decade left to stop global warming/climate change/etc before half of the population starves to death due to rising oceans and whole nations wiped off the earth. Some how, those theories keep turning out to be bunk, yet their creators refuse to adjust their predictions to be inline with observed behavior, instead turning the dial forward another decade and saying "never mind all of those other incorrect predictions... this time the world is going to end, and we are being totally cereal this time guys."

      Quit arguing for religion, we are trying to discuss science here.

    2. Re: Nope. Wrong again. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As with Katrina, the cause is smple.

      God hates people who dwell on flood plains.

    3. Re:Nope. Wrong again. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Get a load of this projecting little ignoramus.

  13. Another prediction bites the dust. by Kernel+Kurtz · · Score: 2

    LOS ANGELES — With California entering its fifth year of a statewide drought, Gov. Jerry Brown moved on Monday to impose permanent water conservation measures and called on water suppliers to prepare for a future made drier by climate change.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2016/0...

    Oh well.

    https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu...

    1. Re:Another prediction bites the dust. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly! We went from no rain for 7 years to way too much rain, problem solved once and for all!

    2. Re:Another prediction bites the dust. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Finally someone is speaking out against the conspiracy. Clearly drought didn't exist because today we get flooding. Just like how in many parts of the United States there was this supposed white powder than fell from the sky, blanketing the ground for months. Everyone knows that even in their wild conspiracies that left three-fourths or more of the year "snow" free. In such a fantasy, why would any even worry about snow removal, thicker clothes, or heating of homes. One should just sell all those beads and rattles because there's simply no reason to prepare for the future.

      Now, if you'll excuse me I'm going to go quit my job. My rent is paid. My belly is full. There's no reason for me to lift a finger because I have no reason to ever worry again.

    3. Re:Another prediction bites the dust. by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Aquifers can accommodate several times as much water as surface storage, but they are not refilled in a year — even a year like this one. Too much of the water runs off. Deforestation and land development tend to cause land to shed water. It runs into the ocean instead of into land which can contain it until it can seep into aquifers. Los Angeles is the American poster child for this; it's got so much pavement that basically all of the water runs off immediately. I've read that they get enough rainfall per year to make up over 90% of their water use, but that it runs into the ocean instead of storage systems.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    4. Re:Another prediction bites the dust. by Kernel+Kurtz · · Score: 1

      The point is droughts and floods are not a new thing, despite what some interests would like you to believe.

  14. well, what do you expect? by p51d007 · · Score: 4, Informative

    I lived near the Missouri river in mid Missouri, from birth to 20. When you travel around the capital area of Jefferson City, you see "the river bluffs". The Missouri river, as most rivers, have been SQUEEZED and SQUEEZED over the centuries, to claim the rich soil used to grow crops. When you have a major event, the river wants to go where it was, not where man "thinks" it should be.

    1. Re:well, what do you expect? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Meanwhile, 1000 miles from the Missouri river, low-lying areas that used to be dry year-round have been full of standing water for the last six months. The water table is rising. Basements are getting wet. Interesting times are coming!

  15. Republican incompetence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/nebraska/articles/2019-02-10/despite-fierce-weather-nebraska-avoids-climate-change-plan

    > Hughes, a farmer from Venango, said he questions whether man-made made climate change is real and noted that Nebraska has always dealt with droughts, floods and wildfires. He argued the state shouldn't spend money to prepare for problems he said may never materialize.

  16. and yet... by slashmydots · · Score: 0

    Trump still think it's caused by karma or bad luck or mexicans or something that isn't climate change.

  17. WTF does "historic" mean in this context? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    WTF? "Historic, widespread flooding" - what the hell does that mean? American cretins.

  18. 200 million people affected? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That's nearly 2 out of 3 Americans. This is gross exaggeration. (Perhaps TFA clarifies this, and the clipped part is just sensationalism, but still...)

  19. Not "historic" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Check the Wikipedia for the great flood of 1927 !
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Mississippi_Flood_of_1927

    That was an historic flood..spawned Memphis Minnie's and Led Zeppelin's cover "When the Levee Breaks"

    27000 square miles flooded, 30 feet deep, the cost in2007 dollars was almost a trillion (!) dollars.

    This is the current trick, to scare people with weather, to force radical "climate change" agendas. There has always been flooding and"extreme"weather. The media now hypes it to drive their agenda.

    In reality, there is NO trends to more extreme weather.
    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/10/climate-craziness-of-the-week-usa-today-thinks-severe-weather-began-in-1980/#more-72220

  20. Food prices? by whitroth · · Score: 1

    Slashdot *used* to have intelligent people posting, a dozen and more years ago. Now, you have to dig through the trolls and the 16 yr old idiots.

    Haven't seen the headlines telling you all that the price of food, later this year, will go *way* up: bread, tortillas, meat (what do you think they feed cattle, pigs and chickens?).

    Wonder if it'll result in food riots in the countries the US exports to....

  21. Odd by NetNed · · Score: 1

    Sooo they are going to ignore the dam break that was from bad construction that caused Iowa's flooding?? Am I also supposed to ignore all the early thaws or quick thaws of my childhood in the 70's?? If you are going to tell me some bullshit at least have it account for things that happened in the past and when facts come out about failed dams that the US Army Corp. built. That way you don't look as full of shit as you do now.

    1. Re:Odd by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The 70s? That is nothing in time. Global warming has been occurring since industrialization started and its chemical mechanism was first recognized in .