Extreme Drought to Extreme Flood: Weather Whiplash Hits the Midwest!!!

The rains that fell in a 24-hour period ending at 7 am EDT Thursday, April 18, 2013 over Northern Illinois were the type of rains one would expect see fall only once every 40 years (yellow colors), according to METSTAT, Inc. ( [link to www.metstat.com.)] METSTAT computed the recurrence interval statistics based on gauge-adjusted radar precipitation and frequency estimates from NOAA Atlas 14 Volume 2, published in 2004 ( [link to dipper.nws.noaa.gov] METSTAT does not supply their precipitation recurrence interval forecasts or premium analysis products for free, but anyone can monitor the real-time analysis (observed) at: [link to metstat.com]

Damages from the April 2013 Midwest U.S. flood in Illinois, Michigan, and Missouri are likely to run into the hundreds of millions of dollars. Some of the impacts at the flood levels predicted include:

St. Louis, MO:
Major flooding begins. At this level the Choteau Island Levee, protecting 2400 acres, is overtopped. Also, Lemay Park just south of Lemay Ferry Road will begin flood

Cape Girardeau, MO:
Many homes in the Cape Girardeau area are affected and evacuations may be required. Over 100,000 acres is flooded. Numerous roads are closed.

Hannibal, MO:
The Sny Island and South Quincy levees are overtopped between River Mile 315.4 and 264.3, flooding 110,000 acres. The South River levee is overtopped between River Mile 320.5 and 312.1, flooding 10,000 acres.

Quincy, IL:
Missouri Highway 168 east of Palmyra near the BASF plant closes; Quincy Waterworks inundated.

Flood-Drought-Flood Weather Whiplash
Residents along the Mississippi River have experienced a severe case of flood-drought-flood weather whiplash over the past two years. The Mississippi reached its highest level on record at New Madrid, Missouri on May 6, 2011, when the river crested at 48.35'. Flooding on the Mississippi and Missouri rivers that year cost an estimated $5 billion. The next year, after the great drought of 2012, the river had fallen by over 53' to an all time record low of -5.32' on August 30, 2012. Damage from the great drought is conservatively estimated at $35 billion. Next Tuesday, the river is expected to be at flood stage again in New Madrid, 40' higher than the August 2012 record low. Now, that is some serious weather whiplash. I'm often asked about the seemingly contradictory predictions from climate models that the world will see both worse floods and worse droughts due to global warming. Well, we have seen a classic example in the Midwest U.S. over the past two years of just how this kind of weather whiplash is possible. A warmer atmosphere is capable of bringing heavier downpours, since warmer air can hold more water vapor. We saw an example of this on Thursday morning, when an upper air balloon sounding over Lincoln, Illinois revealed near-record amounts of moisture for this time of year. The precipitable water--how much rain could fall if one condensed all the water vapor in a column above the ground into rain--was 1.62", just barely short of the Illinois April record for precipitable water of 1.64" set on April 20, 2000 (upper air records go back to 1948.) Thursday's powerful low pressure system was able to lift that copious moisture, cool it, and condense it into record rains. So how can you have worse droughts with more moisture in the air? Well, you still need a low pressure system to come along and wring that moisture out of the air to get rain. When natural fluctuations in jet stream patterns take storms away from a region, creating a drought, the extra water vapor in the air won't do you any good. There will be no mechanism to lift the moisture, condense it, and generate drought-busting rains. The drought that ensues will be more intense, since temperatures will be hotter and the soil will dry out more.

The new normal in the coming decades is going to be more and more extreme flood-drought-flood cycles like we are seeing now in the Midwest, and this sort of weather whiplash is going to be an increasingly severe pain in the neck for society. We'd better prepare for it, by building a more flood-resistant infrastructure and developing more drought-resistant grains, for example. And if we continue to allow heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide continue to build up in the atmosphere at the current near-record pace, no amount of adaptation can prevent increasingly more violent cases of weather whiplash from being a serious threat to the global economy and the well-being of billions of people.
[link to www.wunderground.com]

Flood in USA on Saturday, 20 April, 2013 at 04:39 (04:39 AM) UTC.

Description
Officials in Kokomo say the fire department there has used boats and heavy equipment to evacuate more than 100 people from homes because of rising flood waters. Kokomo Fire Chief Pat O'Neill was urging people trapped in their homes to call 911. City officials say the Wildcat Creek hit the highest mark recorded since a gauge was installed in 1950. City officials said Duke Energy workers were disabling power in some areas because of the danger caused by the water.
[link to hisz.rsoe.hu]

Heading down to Lowell, MI to fill sandbags or whatever else needs to be done. That snow last night made this a perfectly miserable job. [link to water.weather.gov]

In No Illinois. Weather has been freakish. On top of all the rain, we are stuck in a cold spell. Yesterday, these mini-blizzards kept erupting. It was cloudy, then all of a sudden, heavy snow and wind would come out of nowhere. Then back to fine. Then wind/snow. It was very strange.

Are they haarping us or something? lol

They were saying the water could reach Main Street in Lowell. (I'm in Alto)

Work in a town south of STL, on the Mississippi, our level will be close to 42 ft, 27ft is flood level... Have two roads closed already, due to flooding. Some are saying this will be another '93... I don't think it will be that bad, but do expect more road closures, and some silly people still trying to go through the water...

Actually this is good...the spring here should cause some flooding..
We should celebrate it like they did for the Nile floods!

Ryan Maue‏@RyanMaue42 min
Another strong Canadian/Arctic front to plunge to S. Texas by Wednesday. Temps 10-30°F below normal over E. US [link to twitter.com (secure)]

Same here (also N. Il.). We had hail, then snow, then sun, then snow and hail. Windy all day. It's never been this windy for this long in the 28 years I've lived here.

The Weather Channel‏@weatherchannel4 h
The latest on the widespread, massive river flooding ongoing in parts of the Midwest: [link to wxch.nl]

Scattered showers will continue to move thru PR this afternoon and tonight.Sunday and the early part of next week looks more dry.


AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE SAN JUAN PR
257 PM AST SAT APR 20 2013

.SYNOPSIS...UPPER LOW EXPECTED TO CONTINUE TO DRIFT TO THE
SOUTHEAST BEFORE IT MERGES WITH A LARGER CUTOFF LOW ON MONDAY.
SURFACE HIGH PRESSURE OVER THE NORTH ATLANTIC IS EXPECTED TO
REMAIN STRONG AND CONTINUE TO CAUSE BREEZY CONDITIONS TO THE LOCAL
AREA FOR THE NEXT FEW DAYS.

&&

.DISCUSSION...SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS HAVE REMAINED OVER THE
CARIBBEAN WATERS AND A FEW DEVELOPED ACROSS WESTERN PUERTO RICO
AFTER THE SEA BREEZE DEVELOPED. THIS ACTIVITY IS EXPECTED TO
CONTINUE INTO THE EVENING HOURS. MIMIC-TPW AND GFS MODEL SUGGESTS
THAT DRIER AIR IS MOVING IN AND IS EXPECTED TO BE IN OUR AREA
BY TOMORROW MORNING. IN ADDITION...GFS MODEL SUGGESTS THAT UPPER
LEVEL CONVERGENCE WILL DOMINATE OVER THAT LOCAL AREA BY THIS
EVENING..WHILE THE UPPER LEVEL DIVERGENCE MOVES FURTHER SOUTH.

SUNDAY THROUGH TUESDAY LOOKS DRIER AND MORE PLEASANT THAN IT HAS
BEEN FOR THE PAST FEW DAYS. PRECIPITABLE WATER VALUES COULD BE AS
LOW AS ONE INCH WITH AN EAST NORTHEAST WIND AND MOSTLY ISOLATED SHOWERS.


&&

.AVIATION...SHRA/TSRA ARE EXPECTED ACROSS THE LOCAL AREA THROUGH
AT LEAST 22/00Z. AS A RESULT...MOUNTAIN OBSCURATIONS AND TEMPO
MVFR/IFR CONDITIONS ARE POSSIBLE IN AND AROUND TISX...TJSJ...TJPS...
TJBQ AND TJMZ THROUGHOUT THE EVENING HOURS. EAST NORTHEAST WINDS AT
15 TO 20 KTS WITH SOME HIGHER GUSTS WILL CONTINUE ACROSS THE LOCAL
FLYING AREA.


&&

.MARINE...SEAS OF 7 FT OR LESS AND WINDS OF 21 KTS OR LESS EXPECTED.
SCATTERED TO NUMEROUS SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS EXPECTED MAINLY
ACROSS THE CARIBBEAN COASTAL WATERS. GUIDANCE SUGGESTS THAT SEAS
WILL GO BELOW 7 FEET AS WELL AS WINDS WILL DECREASE SLIGHTLY ACROSS
THE ATLANTIC WATERS BY SUNDAY EVENING.


&&

.PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS...
SJU 75 84 74 85 / 60 60 20 20
STT 74 86 75 85 / 40 40 20 20

Jon Passantino‏@passantino17 h
Major flooding in downtown Grand Rapids, MI [link to twitter.com (secure)]

Major Flooding Continues in the Midwest

The recent torrent of rainfall in the Midwest has sent river levels rising across the region. Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Indiana and Michigan have been hardest hit states. Some river levels will approach and even break records. Numerous flood warnings are in effect.

Models have come into much more agreement on our developing winter storm for early in the week. A strong Canadian cold front brings increasing snow for much of Montana on Sunday. The snow will shift southward into Wyoming and western South Dakota on Sunday night, including the Black Hills. 6-12" of accumulation is possible, mainly in the higher elevations and 5-8" for Rapid City. The snow advances southward into Colorado, western Nebraska and streaks northeast through SD/NE into southern MN, including Minneapolis. Denver is in-line to receive 2-4" and Minneapolis 1-3" by Tuesday morning. As the cold front blasts southward snow develops through western Kansas into the northern TX panhandle with some accumulations by midday Tuesday. Snow will fade away as the system heads eastward into the MS Valley. At this time, it appears that significant travel disruptions are not likely with the late season nature of the storm, but some minor travel issues are possible early in the morning Monday and Tuesday for the central High Plains into the Rockies. If we were to name the system, it would likely take place later Sunday or early Monday.

FLOOD ADVISORY
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
247 PM EDT SUN APR 21 2013

FLC021-212045-
/O.NEW.KMFL.FA.Y.0014.130421T1847Z-130421T2045Z/
/00000.N.ER.000000T0000Z.000000T0000Z.000000T0000 Z.OO/
247 PM EDT SUN APR 21 2013

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN MIAMI HAS ISSUED AN

* URBAN FLOOD ADVISORY FOR...
WEST CENTRAL COLLIER COUNTY IN SOUTHWEST FLORIDA...
THIS INCLUDES THE CITY OF NAPLES...

* UNTIL 445 PM EDT

* AT 245 PM EDT NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED 1
TO 2 INCHES OF RAINFALL OVER SOUTHWEST COLLIER COUNTY OVER THE LAST HOUR.
AN ADDITIONAL 1 TO 2 INCHES CAN BE EXPECTED OVER THE NEXT HOUR OR SO.

HEAVY RAINFALL WILL CAUSE PONDING OF WATER IN URBAN AREAS, HIGHWAYS,
STREETS AND UNDERPASSES AS WELL AS OTHER POOR DRAINAGE AREAS AND LOW
LYING SPOTS. RUNOFF WILL ALSO CAUSE ELEVATED WATERS LEVELS IN CANALS
AND DITCHES.

[link to water.weather.gov] The red River is slowly rising at Fargo almost reaching the action line