This Weekend, Flooding Worsens. So Does Drought

Flooding in Missouri this week.  

For seemingly the upteenth time, I awoke this morning to news that a flood watch has been posted for Vermont, where I live.

It's been close to a record wet June, and another very soggy storm is on its way, and it will surely make the mudpit underfoot around my are worse.

Over the past couple of days, there's been an amazingly huge area in the eastern half of the United States under flood watches, warnings and advisories.

A huge swath of land from Missouri to New England is, or will get, anywhere from two to six inches of rain.

Last year, I dubbed that summer the Year Of The Flood, since there seemed to be so many local flash floods and torrential rains. I kind of did the same the year before.

But this year is starting to shape up as even worse than the previous two, at least in the eastern half of the nation, away from the epic drought out on the West Coast.

Oklahoma City has already had 34.36 inches of rain this year, almost double what they normally get by now. Louisville, Kentucky stands a substantial 7.5 inches of rain more than they normally get by now, thanks to frequent flooding rains since March.

Friday's flooding pretty much drowned the city of Muncie, Indiana, as a for-instance. There was also a lot of flooding in and around around St. Louis, Missouri. 

Here in Vermont, it had actually been a little on the dry side until June. Burlington, Vermont has received 7.70 inches of rain so far this month. If no more rain falls this month, it will still be the fourth wettest June on record, and more than an inch of rain is forecast for the next couple of days.

The storm that brought the extensive flooding in the Midwest and Ohio River Valley Friday is evolving into a system that is more typical of winter than summer.

Usually, in the summer, weather systems are prettyweak.  In part due to high summer humidity, these weak storms can often cause torrential thunderstorms and downpours, and flash flooding does happen somewhere in the country every summer.

But this storm is more like a nor'easter, though it's traveling more inland. It's got the kind of upper level jet stream support you more typically get in the winter. That means the Northeast is in for widespread heavy rain, not just the local downpours usually get this time of year.

Several places will also get quite windy, especially along the western slopes of Vermont's Green Mountains and New York's Adirondack mountains, and along the New England coast. Again, this type of wind is fairly normal in the winter, but pretty bizarre for summer.

You can never tell for sure if this particular heavy rain and flood episode, or any particular one this spring or summer was caused by global warming. It could have been due to chance, or certain odd weather patterns.

However, this increasing trend toward torrential flooding rains is consistent with global warming. A warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture, and if a storm system comes along, climate change could easily be making the rains with these storms heavier than they otherwise would be.

So a storm that in the past would cause minor nuisance flooding could now, at least theoretically, unleash a huge blast of destructive water.

That's not the problem out west. The drought continues unabated. Worse, the weather pattern that is encouraging the eastern United States storminess is also causing a record heat wave up and down the western third of the nation, and on into western Canada.

Hot weather worsens droughts by increasing evaporation. Plus they encourage wildfires, and several are burning out that way now.

It looks like the weather extremes are going to continue for awhile