78 F. average high on August 30.
81 F. high on August 31, 2016.
August 31, 1949: The earliest snowfall on record for Minnesota occurs on this date. A trace of snow is recorded at the new Duluth airport.
August 31, 1947: A tornado hits Le Center, killing one person.
Suddenly Minnesota Weather Looks Almost Reasonable
We get our fair share of grief for living here, but suddenly the frequent cold fronts and occasional tornadoes don't look quite so forbidding. A generous supply of cool, dry Canadian air inoculates us from the worst storms on Earth.
We get our fair share of grief for living here, but suddenly the frequent cold fronts and occasional tornadoes don't look quite so forbidding. A generous supply of cool, dry Canadian air inoculates us from the worst storms on Earth.
Unlike
tornadoes, hurricanes seem to serve a purpose in nature. They are
"automatic pressure relief valves", transporting heat from the tropics
to the poles. They convert ocean warmth into rain, which has a cooling
effect. Research suggests fewer hurricanes may form in a warming world,
but the storms that do spin up may be more intense.
The
National Weather Service says Harvey was America's 25th 500-year flood
since 2010. One of those was the Duluth flood of 2012.
Expect
a dry sky today and Friday, but the approach of a volatile frontal zone
may set off T-storms early Saturday. By Sunday highs reach the low to
mid 80s. Brush the cobwebs off your shorts and soak up any warmth,
because Labor Day looks windy and cooler - but probably dry.
By the middle of next week highs hold in the 60s with a risk of light jackets. 80s return by mid-September.
Harvey Marks the Most Extreme Rain Event in U.S. History. The Capital Weather Gang put Harvey into perspective: "The rain from Harvey is in a class of its own. The storm has unloaded over 50 inches of rain east of Houston, the greatest amount ever recorded in the Lower 48 states from a single storm. And it’s still raining. John Nielsen-Gammon, Texas state climatologist, said a rain gauge near Mont Belvieu at Cedar Bayou, about 40 miles east of Houston, had registered 51.9 inches of rain through late Tuesday afternoon. This total exceeds the previous record of 48 inches set during tropical cyclone Amelia in Medina, Texas in 1978..."
Harvey May Be Costliest Disaster in U.S. History. A $160 billion storm? At this point nothing would surprise me. Here's an excerpt from USA TODAY: "Hurricane Harvey could
be the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history with a potential
price tag of $160 billion, according to a preliminary estimate from
private weather firm AccuWeather. This is equal to the combined cost of
Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, and represents a 0.8% economic hit to the
gross national product, AccuWeather said. “Parts of Houston, the United
States' fourth largest city, will be uninhabitable for weeks and
possibly months due to water damage, mold, disease-ridden water and all
that will follow this 1,000-year flood,” said AccuWeather president Joel
Myers..."
Photo credit:
the re/insurance market could face $10 billion to $20 billion of losses from hurricane Harvey, while the economic loss could be as high as $150 billion, Buffett said “Nobody has too good a feel, but those don’t strike me as silly in any way...” Details via
Photo credit: "Jason Hendry drives his daughter, Callie, out of their neighborhood on a flooded road in Lumberton, Texas, on Aug. 27, 2017." (Ryan Pelham / Associated Press)
Photo credit: "Before-and-after view from a high rise in Memorial Heights in west Houston, Texas." Aaron Cohan.
Image credit: "An ExxonMobil regulatory filing about an emissions event at its Baytown facility that released 12,000 pounds of hazardous vapors." Screenshot by NewsHour.
Chemical Facilities Face Danger During Harvey Shutdowns. The Houston Chronicle has more detail on the ongoing risk of chemical releases and contamination due to Harvey.
Moving Away From the Coasts Doesn't Mean You're Safe From Flooding. Some of the most intense rains from tropical systems can fall hundreds of miles inland, well away from the coastline. Here's an excerpt from The Washington Post: "...Climate change effects, such as sea level rise and potentially more extreme weather, are increasing the risk of flooding, hurricanes and storm surges in coastal areas. Some communities are considering moving coastal populations inland to protect them. However, our research shows that people should be very careful about moving inland. They can still face flood hazards if their property is in a high-risk flood zone. Flooding can happen wherever large rainstorms stall over an area, as we have seen in Boulder, Colo., in 2013; in Texas and Louisiana in 2016; and over Houston now. However, if communities take steps to reduce flood risk, they can mitigate the danger to people and property..."
* Rain continues from eastern Texas to the panhandle of Florida this morning in association with Harvey, but the heaviest over the past day has fallen across parts of eastern Texas. In the past 24 hours, Beaumont has received over 22” of rain, with over 21.50” of rain observed in Orange, TX. This has led to catastrophic flooding across this portion of southeastern Texas, with a storm shelter in Port Arthur having to move evacuees to another shelter due to flooding.
* Harvey made its third and final landfall early this morning near Cameron, LA, and is now expected to weaken through the rest of the week as the system picks up speed and moves to the northeast. Heavy rain will continue to be possible along and ahead of the path of Harvey, leading to the potential of even more flash flooding. Flash Flood Watches are in effect as far north as western Tennessee for the potential of at least 3-6” of rain.
* The rain has ended in Houston, and they will have a dry stretch of weather through the end of the week. Unfortunately, historic flooding continues across the region. This flooding has the potential to last for weeks or even months. The Harris County Flood Control District reports as of this morning that some homes near the Addicks and Barker reservoirs in the Houston area will remain inundated for weeks, but that most watersheds across the county have crested.
Houston TranStar is keeping a list of high water locations: http://traffic.
View the above map of road closures and flooded roads in Houston from Houston TranStar: https://traffic.
View an interactive map for the state of Texas showing road closures from TXDOT: https://drivetexas.org/#/7/28.
View an interactive map for the state of Louisiana showing road closures from the Louisiana DOTD: https://hb.511la.org/#
The city of Houston emergency information website at http://www.houstonemergency.
Summary: Harvey made its third and final landfall this morning in southwestern Louisiana, and the system is expected to weaken over the next few days as it moves to the northeast. However, heavy rain continues along the path of it, with the Beaumont, TX, area receiving over 20” of rain in the past 24 hours. This rain will continue to lead to catastrophic flooding across parts of Texas and Louisiana. Heavy rain will also be possible along other parts of the northern Gulf Coast and into parts of the Tennessee and Ohio Valleys into the end of the week and the weekend, with rainfall amounts of at least 3-6” expected. In the Houston area, the scene of the heaviest rain from Harvey, they are getting a break in the rain through the end of the week, however catastrophic flooding will continue for the foreseeable future.
Meteorologist D.J. Kayser, Praedictix
Image credit: "In the false-color satellite images below, plants and other vegetation appear green, while urbanized and developed areas appear blue and purple. Drag the slider to see how northwest Houston has changed since 1986."
Photo credit: "In this aerial photo, water is released from the Addicks Reservoir as floodwaters rise from Tropical Storm Harvey on Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017, in Houston." (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP).
The Looming Consequences of Breathing Mold. Once the floodwaters recede the clean-up efforts will begin, but chemical contamination and mold could mean health issues that unfold over many years, according to a story posted at The Atlantic.
What Makes America Great? Just Ask Residents of Houston
All of us are here on borrowed time. All of us want the same thing in
life: to love, to be loved and to make a difference. Amid the
unspeakable catastrophe unfolding in Houston there are stories of
selfless compassion and heroism. The "Cajun Navy" came to the rescue -
thousands of people towing boats; all making a beeline for Houston
without ever being asked. Countless people were rescued by total
strangers. First Responders have stepped up big time; many of them
working around the clock, even though their own homes were flooded out
too. Disasters tend to bring out the best in human nature. And here is
what makes America great: strangers helping strangers - expecting
nothing in return. Faint silver linings in the midst of heartbreaking
tragedy.
Photo credit above: "Rescue boats fill a Houston street from flooded from superstorm Harvey. August 28." CREDIT: AP/David J. Phillip
Super Storm. Here's an image from (non-operational) GOES-16 taken early Tuesday morning, showing the cyclonic swirl, the massive comma cloud of tropical moisture associated with Tropical Storm Harvey.
New Data Set Explores 90 Years of Natural Disasters in the U.S. The Conversation posted a story that caught my eye: "...We created a new database that covers disasters in the United States from 1920 to 2010 at the county level, combining data from the American Red Cross as well as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and its predecessors. Our work shows that people move away from areas hit by the largest natural disasters, but smaller disasters have little effect on migration. The data also showed that these trends may worsen inequality in the U.S., as the rich move away from disaster-prone areas, while the poor are left behind..."
Map credit: The Conversation, CC-BY-ND. Source: Provided by authors Get the data
Image credit: "This drone video taken Aug. 27 shows the historic flooding in Houston caused by Hurricane Harvey." (ahmed.gul/Instagram).
25 Separate 500-Year Floods Across the USA Since 2010. Wow. That's from the National Weather Service, by the way, not prone to conspiracy theories. A 1 in 500 year flood risk means a flood of that magnitude has a 1 in 500 chance of happening in that place - that year. The Washington Post has more details.
What 500-Year Flooding Could Look Like Around Five Cities.
One flood/hurricane-prone metro area is Tampa - St. Pete. How much of
that area would be underwater during a 1 in 500 year flood? The Washington Post reports: "...Analysts say the Tampa Bay area, which includes the cities of Tampa and St. Petersburg, is the most vulnerable in the United States to
flooding and damage in the event of a major hurricane. A direct hit
would likely surpass the cost of Hurricane Katrina, with one Boston firm
that analyzes potential catastrophic damage estimating a cost of more
than $175 billion to the region. More than 30 percent of residents live
in a moderate to high risk flood zone. Unlike the other areas included,
the Tampa Bay region hasn’t experienced a direct hit from a Category 3
or higher hurricane in nearly a century..."
Map credit: "
Many Harvey-Damaged Houston Homes and Businesses Do Not Have Flood Insurance. A story at Fortune made me do a double-take: "A report from data provider CoreLogic says 52% of the properties in Houston that are at a high or moderate risk
of flooding from Hurricane Harvey and its resulting rains are not in
federally-designated flood zones. That means the homes and businesses in
those areas may not have flood insurance, as it's not a requirement for
buildings outside of "special flood hazard area" zones. And that could
be especially disastrous for Houstonians, who learn the hard way that
their homeowners policy doesn't cover some losses from the storm. Flood
damage isn't typically covered under homeowners policies. But a little
water can result in tremendous damage. Just one inch of water in a home
can run up costs of $20,000, according to the National Flood Insurance Program..."
New U.S. Tropical Cyclone Rainfall Record? Check out the National Weather Service's Facebook page for details. Again, this is a year's worth of rain for Houston, falling in roughly 4 days.
The Agony of Deciding to Evacuate a City. WIRED.com walks us through the nightmare of trying to move millions of people: "...Evacuation decisions begin with the weather forecast. This is, in theory, the simplest part of the equation—the movement of a storm depends on laws of physics. Where and when will the storm hit? How much water will it dump and what kind of wind speeds will it threaten? Historically, cities have been more willing to trigger evacuations in coastal areas directly in the path of a large and windy hurricane and less likely when a storm simply threatens to flood.Evacuation plans also depend on highly detailed population data. How many people live in your city and in how many units? How many people have access to cars? How many speak English? How many have pets? How many need help with transportation because they are senior citizens or because they have a disability that makes it harder to get around? Demographics of a city can change rapidly, so officials need the most recent numbers available..."
Photo credit: "An off ramp of Beltway 8 in Houston became a boat launch for rescuers searching for people stranded in floodwaters." Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times.
Trumps Rollback of Flood Protections Risks Further Houston-Style Calamity. Is this the right time to be relaxing building codes in hurricane alley? Here's an excerpt from The Guardian: "...Houston already has some of the laxest building regulations for structures in potential flood zones and the president wants to spread that policy across the US. “It makes no sense,” Steve Ellis, vice-president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, said. “Taxpayers deserve to have the assurance that if they provide assistance to a community to build or rebuild, it’s done in a way that isn’t going to cost taxpayers money in the future.” Storms and flooding are generally becoming costlier and more frequent and data suggests climate change is a leading culprit. Many towns are located in coastal areas and riverine floodplains, where the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) says “building codes are often insufficient in reducing damage from extreme events”. The number of “billion-dollar events” – natural disasters ranging from flooding to wildfires that incur more than $1bn in damage – has risen over the past few decades, increasing in cost from a roughly $10bn five-year average in 1985 to more than $50bn in 2015..."
Photo credit: "Margie David and her husband David Emswiler are rescued by volunteers on a boat from their flooded house in north-west Houston." Photograph: Jay Janner/AP.
Photo credit: "Cases of water donated by Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis, Friday, July 21, 2006, amid a heat wave during the worst power outage in St. Louis history." (The Associated Press).
Photo credit: "(R to L) Brianna Terrazas (Jacob’s sister), Yesenia Terrazas (Jacob’s mother), 16-year-old patient Jacob Terrazas, patient and Dr. Stephen Kimmel, pediatric general surgeon. Terrazas was suffering from a medical condition and Dr. Kimmel canoed to the hospital to perform surgery."
TODAY: Partly sunny, breezy and dry. Winds: SE 7-12. High: 73
THURSDAY NIGHT: Partly cloudy and cool. Low: 55
FRIDAY: Partly sunny, perfect fair weather! Winds: SE 8-13. High: 74
SATURDAY: Few AM storms, PM clearing. Winds: NW 8-13. Wake-up: 59. High: 78
SUNDAY: Warm sunshine, T-storms far northern Minnesota. Winds: S 10-15. Wake-up: 62. High: 83
MONDAY: Mix of clouds and sun, cooler breeze. Winds: NW 10-20. Wake-up: 63. High: 73
TUESDAY: More clouds than sun, autumnlike. Winds: NW 10-15. Wake-up: 55. High: 68
WEDNESDAY: Sunny and pleasant, less wind. Winds: NW 7-12. Wake-up: 51. High: 69
Climate Stories...
Hurricane Harvey and Climate Change: Is There a Connection? Here's a snippet from USA TODAY: "...The
theory goes that a warmer atmosphere would make hurricanes more intense
than they would otherwise be. "Climate change is making even heavier
rainfall possible," noted John W. Nielsen-Gammon, a Texas A&M University meteorologist and the Texas State Climatologist. Another expert, Adam Sobel of Columbia University,
said that "based on many previous studies of extreme precipitation
events, as well as our overall scientific understanding, it is plausible
to expect that they (tropical cyclones) will show some amplification
due to increased water vapor in a warmer atmosphere." But Sobel
said Harvey would have been a huge disaster in Houston with or without
global warming. This is because of the specific meteorological situation
of Harvey (the positions of the high-pressure systems and the jet
stream), and the presence of a major city in the location it is..."
Will Harvey's Damage Shift How Congress Sees Climate Change and Budget Cuts? InsideClimate News reports: "...But Congress at the same time is grappling with a package of White House spending priorities that seem out of step in a post-Harvey era. Under Trump's budget, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), home of the National Weather Service, would face a 16 percent overall cut, with a heavy ax falling on programs like advanced modeling to make weather and storm forecasts more accurate and reliable, a project to upgrade flood prediction, and a tornado warning program for the Southeast. The White House plan is to have the agency's climate research arm—the Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research—bear the largest percentage cut, 32 percent. Trump also proposed to cut $667 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency's state and local grant funding, which aids disaster preparedness and emergency response, and to squeeze the budget of the U.S. Coast Guard, which is coordinating water rescues in East Texas from its Houston Command Center..."
Image credit: "Satellite imagery shows Hurricane Harvey as it made landfall on Aug. 25 as a Category 4 hurricane near Corpus Christi, Texas." Image: NOAA/GOES Project.
Why Harvey is Stuck Near Texas. In addition to warmer temperatures and more water vapor available to fuel Harvey's feeder bands, the storm stalled for the better part of 4-5 days. Was it natural variability? Perhaps, but meteorologists and climate scientists are noticing a slow-down in weather systems, especially during the warm season, which may be linked to rapid warming of the Arctic. Eric Roston reports at Bloomberg: "...Harvey is yet another of several recent weather disasters marked by such shocking staying power, punishing whole regions for days or weeks on end—or longer. Others include a massive heatwave over Russia and flooding in Pakistan in 2010, the Texas drought of 2011, the California drought that began around the same time and continued through this year, and the flooding last year in Texas’s neighbor to east, Louisiana. Sluggishness in storms is a big deal, particularly if they’re increasing in frequency. “It turns a garden-variety disaster into a catastrophe,” said Paul Douglas, a broadcast meteorologist and weather entrepreneur. As Harvey stays put, it functions as a firehose that sucks warm water from the Gulf of Mexico and the atmosphere, and dumps it inland. As of this writing, meteorologists predict Harvey will move north-northeast Wednesday, and up into the Mississippi basin Friday..."
Photo credit: NASA ISS.
How Climate Change Could Turn U.S. Real Estate Prices Upside Down. Everyone wants to live next to water, but (increasingly) the joys of coastal living come with a big price tag. In the near future higher ground may command a premium price, not a water view, according to The Guardian: "...Many of the lessons that Florida has learned since 1992 have parallels in the unfolding disaster in Texas, experts say, and what was already a trend toward factoring in environmental threats and climate change to land and property values looks certain to become the standard nationwide as Houston begins to mop up from the misery of Harvey. “The question is whether people are going to be basing their real estate decisions on climate change futures,” said Hugh Gladwin, professor of anthropology at Florida International University, who says his research suggests higher-standing areas of Miami are becoming increasingly gentrified as a result of sea level rise. “In any coastal area there’s extra value in property, [but] climate change, insofar as it increases risks for those properties from any specific set of hazards – like flooding and storm surge – will decrease value...”
Photo credit: "A man removes some possessions from his home in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey. ‘With storm surge and heavy rainfall increasing and climate and sea level rise, the system is just not working,’ says a flood risk analyst." Photograph: Darren Abate/EPA
Photo credit: David J. Phillip/AP Photo.
Is Climate Change Making Hurricanes Worse? Here's a clip from an analysis at PRI: "...Still, some climate scientists are doing so-called climate attribution studies on hurricanes using more recent historical data. Following 2013’s devastating Typhoon Haiyan, MIT atmospheric scientist Kerry Emanuel used a wind forecasting model and plugged in the thermodynamic conditions of both 30 years ago and present day. “And when we do that,” Emanuel told The World in 2013, “we find that the wind speeds are about 10 percent larger now.” Emanuel said the destruction wrought by windstorms goes up quickly with wind speed, “so that really corresponds to something like 30 to 40 percent more damage than the same exact event might've done had it occurred in the thermal environment of the 1980s.” More recently, Emanuel has shown that hurricanes that intensify just before landfall, giving local residents less time to prepare, should increase due to global warming..."
Photo credit: "Waves break over the sea wall ahead of Hurricane Franklin in Veracruz, Mexico, Aug. 9, 2017." Credit: Victor Yanez/Reuters.
What You Can and Can't Say About Climate Change and Hurricane Harvey. Here's a snippet from a Washington Post story: "...The storm is a bit more intense, bigger and longer lasting than it otherwise would be,” added Kevin Trenberth, a climate researcher with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. And then there’s sea level — it’s higher along the Texas coast than it was 100 years ago or more. At least part of that is because of climate change and its melting of ice and swelling of ocean water — though there are other factors in the mix, too, such as the subsidence of land. Sea level matters for storm surge, one key destructive aspect of any hurricane. “New York, when Sandy hit, the sea level was already about a foot higher than it was 100 years earlier,” Emanuel said. “So if Sandy had hit in 1912, it probably would not have flooded Lower Manhattan...”
Storm Harvey: Impacts Likely Worsened Due To Global Warming. Here's an excerpt from the Pottsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research: "...More tentative, yet quite possibly also relevant, is a general slowdown of atmospheric summer circulation in the mid-latitudes (Coumou et al, 2015). This is a consequence of the disproportionally strong warming in the Arctic; it can make weather systems move less and stay longer in a given location – which can significantly enhance the impacts of rainfall extremes, just like we’re sadly witnessing in Houston. We do not expect a change of the overall frequency of tropical storms, and so far we do not observe a significant change in this regard. In contrast, we expect from theory and models a change in intensity – the strongest tropical storms could become even stronger due to increasing sea surface temperatures, because this is where these storms get their energy from. That’s the reason they develop only above water being at least 26 degrees Celsius warm..."
Climate Scientists Connect the Dots. The field of "attribution" tries to tie a warming climate with specific extreme weather events. Vox reports on how much of Harvey is natural variability vs. weather spiked by a warmer, wetter climate: "...In
conclusion, while we cannot say climate change ‘caused’ hurricane
Harvey (that is an ill-posed question), we can say that it exacerbate
several characteristics of the storm in a way that greatly increased the
risk of damage and loss of life,” Mann wrote. “Climate change worsened
the impact of Hurricane Harvey.” Other climatologists agree with Mann.
Kevin Trenberth, a senior scientist at the US National Center for
Atmospheric Research, told the Atlantic,
“The human contribution can be up to 30 percent or so up to the total
rainfall coming out of the storm. … It may have been a strong storm, and
it may have caused a lot of problems anyway — but [human-caused climate
change] amplifies the damage considerably...”
Harvey, The Hurricane That Humans Helped Cause. The hurricane would have probably formed either way, but a warmer, wetter background environment made the storm worse. Here's an excerpt from The New York Times: "...We don't display the same fussiness in other important areas. No individual case of lung cancer can be definitely linked to smoking, as Heidi Cullen, the chief scientist at Climate Central, notes. Few vehicle accidents can be definitly linked to alcohol, and few saved lives can be definitely linked to seatbelts. Yet smoking, drunken driving and seatbeltless riding each created a public health crisis. Once the link became clear and widely understood, people changed their behavior and prevented a whole lot of suffering. Climate change is on its way to becoming a far worse public health crisis than any of those other problems. Already, it has aggravated droughts, famines and deadly heat waves..."
It's a Fact: Climate Change Made Hurricane Harvey More Deadly. Climate scientist Michael Mann reports for The Guardian: "What can we say about the role of climate change in the unprecedented disaster that is unfolding in Houston with Hurricane Harvey? There are certain climate change-related factors that we can, with great confidence, say worsened the flooding. Sea level rise attributable to climate change – some of which is due to coastal subsidence caused by human disturbance such as oil drilling – is more than half a foot (15cm) over the past few decades (see here for a decent discussion). That means the storm surge was half a foot higher than it would have been just decades ago, meaning far more flooding and destruction. In addition to that, sea surface temperatures in the region have risen about 0.5C (close to 1F) over the past few decades from roughly 30C (86F) to 30.5C (87F), which contributed to the very warm sea surface temperatures (30.5-31C, or 87-88F)..."
Tree-Killing Beetles Spread Into Northern U.S. Forests as Temperatures Rise. Because it's just not getting as cold as it did in the past. Here's an excerpt from InsideClimate News: "Southern
pine beetles are among the most destructive insects invading North
America's pine forests today, and they're spreading farther north as
global temperatures rise, putting entire ecosystems at risk and creating
fuel for wildfires as they kill the trees they infest. A new study
shows the insects' range could reach Nova Scotia by 2020 and cover more
than 270,000 square miles of forest from the upper Midwest to Maine and
into Canada by 2080.
Winter cold snaps that once killed the beetles in their larval stage
are becoming less frequent at the northern edge of the beetles' current
range, which will allow them to multiply and spread into new territory
quickly, the study's authors say..."
Photo credit: "Southern pine beetles lay their eggs under the bark of trees, eventually killing them as they cut off water flow and nutrients." Credit: Erich Vallery/USDA.
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