OT: Flooding in SE Michigan
Pouring rain last night in Detroit. Woke up to see standing water in the backyard. Stuff is strewn all over in the basement, but all that’s left is mud, maybe sewage. The news is showing massive flooding on I-94 and I-75. I’ve never seen it this bad. Hope you all are safe!
Had a lake running in between ours and neighbor’s house in Novi. Basement only wet in one spot. Shop-vac’ed it up. Ran the dehumidifier on continuous and held the sump float up to get a lot of it out.
"held the sump float up" I haven't the slightest what this means. (I live in San Diego)
News said that Detroit was hit by 5.8” of rain. Reminiscent of the big storm about 7 yrs ago. The freeways flooded all around Detroit then, divers had to check cars sunken under filthy water. I drove through Berkley the following day and basement furniture and belongings were curbed everywhere. It was a disaster.
forecast is for a week of rain. This is when sewage gets discharged directly into St. Clair here on the East side. All the people with great lakefront property can witness the parade of tampons and turds.
It's not good! Especially seeing as it's supposed to rain all week. Glad I don't live in Dearborn or Dearborn Heights.
Still better than Seattle though. 111 degree high, in June, in the Pacific Northwest? Ugh.
Checking in from Seattle. It’s hot. Kids are at green lake swimming. Bigger concern is later summer impact on forest fires.
And I'm sure Seattle isn't nearly as bad as the interior. A lot drier and hotter in general east of the Cascades or whatever range runs north and south just to the east of the city. The climate changes pretty severely.
Record flooding not seen in 89 years. Not the last 24hrs but 7 yrs ago. Will this be more common? Probably.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/detroit-hit-by-record-rains-flooding-1407854759
Depends on who you wish the believe. We were in a moderate drought only a few days ago. I'll bet we won't see this type of wet pattern repeat itself anytime soon.
Why not just believe the data?
“In recent years, a higher percentage of precipitation in the United States has come in the form of intense single-day events. The prevalence of extreme single-day precipitation events remained fairly steady between 1910 and the 1980s but has risen substantially since then. Nationwide, nine of the top 10 years for extreme one-day precipitation events have occurred since 1996. The occurrence of abnormally high annual precipitation totals (as defined by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) has also increased.”
Data and evidence vs. propaganda
Who will win?
*looks around America*
im gonna go with propaganda unfortunately
propaganda always wins...this is the 21st century in the united states....almost noone is capable of thinking for themselves anymore. we spend our days in our cozy little echo chambers
OK, Blue: check this out for yourself...
Go to weather.gov/dtx/wetmon for the Top 20 all time wettest months at Detroit. There are not too many 21st century that populate the data set. You can also check out the top 20 wettest Junes by just changing the last backslash to wetjun.
Yes, more 21st century years are populating that list.
IMO, NOAA data is unreliable because they'll choose arbitrary starting points where a marked up wards trend can be illustrated.
Single day hi end precip events are a function of mainly a denser network of observations which makes it easier to get a max precip areas. There are dozens to hundreds of co-op measuring obs that service all the local NOAA-NWS offices. (especially since 1996)
Yes, with additional rainfall forecast in SE MI, we have already made the Top 10 wettest June and will add to that.
Like I said, you are free to believe what you want to believe. When you look at these lists of Top 20 wettest, just take note of all the years prior to 1996 that made the list.
While monthly rainfall totals tell us something, extreme rainfall events are usually focused on daily or even hourly totals.
https://statesummaries.ncics.org/chapter/mi/
“The observed number of days with extreme precipitation events (annual number of days with precipitation greater than 2 inches) for 1900–2014, averaged over 5-year periods; these values are averages from 17 long-term reporting stations. The dark horizontal line represents the long-term average. A typical station experiences between 1 and 2 such events every two years. In recent years, Michigan has experienced an increasing number of extreme rain events, with a record number of such events over the past 10 years. Source: CICS-NC and NOAA NCEI.”
it isn’t a question of what I believe, it is what the data actually says. The science is just not that complicated:
1. We have known since the 1800s that greenhouse gases are important to regulating the temperature on earth - it would be colder if we did not have any,
2. We have data from the 1950s showing increases in C02 in the atmosphere and we know that mankind has been pumping significant amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
3. We have plenty of data showing temperatures going up.
4. Temperature impacts the hydrological cycle, causing both longer periods of drought and more extreme rainfall events. All of these things are being observed.
And yes, all of this is on top of a randomness to climate. There have been extreme rainfall events in the past, there have been periods of drought in the past, there will be periods of cold weather in the future. But most projections have been anticipating more droughts, hotter temperatures and more extreme rainfall events. All of these things are in fact happening. This is not a question of “belief”, it is a question of looking at actual data (data related to the impact of concern (e.g, not monthly rainfall totals when the issue of concern is much shorter tern extreme rainfall events)).
Also note that the data cited is from a group of long term monitoring sites so it isn’t skewed by an increase in the number of monitoring sites as you “believe”.
The density of the network of co-op and additional rainfall monitoring stations has added greatly to the determination of rainfall patterns and max rainfall location per hi- end rainfall events. Coincidently, Doppler Rainfall estimates came on board on or around 1996 when that system was upgraded. Thusly, these single heavy rainfall events are easier to identify. I do know there is more precipitable water vapor in the atmosphere largely due a strong Bermuda High over the Western Atlantic-which is multi decadal cycle and impacts the Eastern US, and not induced by humans. (This "warm cycle stated n the late 1990s and could go on for another 10-20 years before reversing to a colder cycle-1950s-1990s)
The hydrologic cycle is also dependent on the massive urbanization this nation has undergone since just the 1960s. The transformation of land to accomodate all of the roads, freeways, homes, commercial buildings and the drainage system can account for urban flooding issues. Note that the population of the US went from 180M to over 330M in a little over 60 years. Runoff from heavy rainfall is magnified by this. Many or us are living in areas that were once wetland or forested areas previously.
You are smart enough to understand. It is pointless to get deeper into the weeds on this topic.
Have a good day and let's go blue and hope Michigan has a better than expected football season!
As the study noted, and I then highlighted for you: “The observed number of days with extreme precipitation events (annual number of days with precipitation greater than 2 inches) for 1900–2014, averaged over 5-year periods; these values are averages from 17 long-term reporting stations”
all of your babbling about the improvements to doppler radar and additional monitoring stations don’t skew results if you use the same number of long term monitoring stations. Further, while urbanization certainly makes flooding worse, it doesn’t impact the amount of rainfall which is what the stations are monitoring.
i know you are smart enough to understand that if you throw enough tangentially related information at the argument, you will convince many that the data are unclear on this point. Unfortunately that strategy works. It doesn’t however change the fact that you have yet to actually counter either of the sources that I have presented that clearly show extreme rainfall events are becoming more common. You can either believe what you want to believe or you can objectively look at the facts. I understand that from your perspective it is pointless to further debate this topic because you have yet to find any facts that support your preconceived belief.
You said you've been working on this issue for 20 years.
Did you by chance push forward the narrative of an Ice Age just 20 years ago?
No?
Global Cooling was ALL the rage from the 70's to 1999. That includes your 20 years you've been "working on this issue".
Did you study global cooling in the 90's?
You are swaying in the wind with whatever climate "crisis" is important that decade.
Not sure what world you live in, but in 1992, 197 countries agreed to set up the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and in 1997 the Kyoto Protocol was adopted. It has 192 signatory states. They are both very much focused on global warming. Other than skeptics like yourself, very few people have focused much time or effort in addressing global cooling. Serious scientists have focused on global warming since at least as far back as the late 1950s when measurements of CO2 were begun at Mauna Lua in Hawaii by David Keeling. Dr Hansen has been warning about climate change since the 1990s.
It is impressive how much disinformation one disgruntled, previously banned mgoblogger can sprout in less than 12 hours. Kudos to you xtra.
Scientific method has nothing to do with "belief".
Because data and science is filtered through humans. And humans are biased, even when they are trying not to be. Unless you work with the data regularly and/or captured it yourself, there is a lot of room for doubt. There are a ton of subjective decisions that go into studies like this, such as: Which data gets thrown out vs kept? What adjustments are made or not made? How do we define our terms? What sample size do we use? What is our starting point? What assumptions do we make? What is our sample size?
Yes, but when many studies come to similar conclusions, maybe the bias is more in the people who keep searching for any data they can to fit their narrative. When the vast majority of the underlying science and the vast majority of the data point in the same direction, the onus is on the doubters to start coming up with more credible data to demonstrate legitimate reasons for doubt, There are plenty of incredibly well funded organizations interested in spreading that doubt and yet the data keeps pointing in the direction of human induced climate change is real, the impacts are significant and measurable and the solutions are nowhere near as expensive as the doubters claim.
How do you know you aren’t being fed a narrative that there is a lot of data in support of the theory? Have you looked at all the data yourself, or are you relying on an “expert” to tell you the results of the data. How do you know the data which contradicts the mainstream narrative is in fact wrong? Are you easily able to distinguish the good science from junk science? I’m certainly not able to tell, and the vast majority of people are not qualified. Again, unless you work with the data yourself you wouldn’t be able to know. You’re relying on scientists to tell you what the data means. Hopefully they don’t have biases like the rest of us, such as group think and confirmation bias.
Your best point is that a lot of evidence points in one direction, which is fair. But a lot of the data has a projection component to it that is highly subjective because predicting the future is not easy. But we’ve been lied to on a mass scale before - think of the false anti-fat, pro- carb narrative that has dominated mainstream health for years. The food pyramid was a massively dangerous lie. They had “evidence” for that too and yet that bs narrative still exists to a degree. Science is great, but scientists are flawed like all of us.
I agree that the solution is cheap, and in fact, already exists if we invest more in it. If the climate people are so worried about climate catastrophe, why don’t they follow the science that nuclear energy emits zero CO2? It’s also far safer now than older versions. And the waste can even be consumed in the process. Why not push nuclear instead of half baked solar and wind energy? None of this is about science, it’s about a narrative of helplessness and fearmongering so some crony capitalists can get government subsidies.
I have a mechanical engineering degree from Michigan and have been working on the climate issue for over 20 years. There is too much data for any one person to have looked at, but I have in fact read reports from all sides of the issue and worked with scientists with a wide range of perspectives. (I personally spend more time on the mitigation side than the impacts side). And no, I am not pocketing lots of money from government subsidies of any energy technologies.
You may want to ask the engineers from Southern Company or the ratepyers in Georgia how successful pushing nuclear has been. If you truly looked at the data, you would know that even without subsidies, wind and solar are quite competitive. Unfortunately there are many entrenched special interests who would prefer to just build more gas. The biggest subsidies come in the form of fossil fuel interests pushing all the risk of climate change onto everyone else - like all the people with flooded basements in Michigan.
Which climate issue have you been working on?
The Ice Age projected in the 80's? Or the hole in the ozone layer?
Which latest climate crisis are you working on?
Deleted/edited original comment. Definitely went over the top and to in-necessary places.
You nailed it with sample size. Huge differences between today and 30-50 years ago alone, let alone comparing to the late 1800s when some weather records were kept.
I do work with local and national climate data regularly. There is a lot of info and research on the quality of the sample size and thus, much debate about it. As for our starting point, weather records vary from place to place. In Detroit,1874 is a starting point. There are US weather records back to the mid 1800 but the network was so sparse and were hand written accounts. Ice core samples from Greenland and Antarctica give us real clues to periodic warm and cool periods back millions of years. Tree ring data also tell us about drought and wet cycles going back a few thousand years.
Bottom line, pick your starting point. There's no real consensus on that. I like the much longer, thousands of years point of view. In the end, it's all up for debate.
Real scientists pick different starting points for many reasons. The first of those is, what ate you studying? Different questions require looking at different time periods. If you are a state highway department looking at whether the 100 year flood projections have stood the test of time and are still appropriate, something in the 150 year range covering the data you used in your original projections and newer data may make perfect sense. If you are looking at how earth’s orbit has impacted global temperatures, much longer temperature records would be more appropriate.
Another factor is where are your datasets coming from. Obviously we have much longer records from ice cores then satellites. Interestingly, using data from since when modern record-keeping began began in the 1880s is pretty relevant to the question of what impacts the increasing use of fossil fuels.
Many scientists across multiple disciplines have been studying these questions for decades, and despite your assertion, there us more agreement in that data than you suggest.
1. There have clearly been hot and cold periods before. They are explained by any number of phenomena including the earth’s orbit (the Milankovitch Cycle), volcanos, solar variability and other factors.
2. We are seeing an unusually warm period, not just in terms of the last 120 years of measured data, but in terms of longer term datasets.
3. Increases in manmade emissions of greenhouse gases are consistent with the warming we are seeing.
4. Other causes of past warming are not consistent with the warming we are now seeing.
5. As the planet warms, we are seeing feedbacks occur which one would expect to accelerate warming. These include: as ice melts, the ocean absorbs more heat from the sun and there is less white ice to reflect the heat from the sun. As permafrost melts, more methane is released.
These are not just my beliefs, they are based on the work of countless scientists, from organizations like NASA, NOAA and schools like U of M. You will certainly be able to find individual scientists and studies that say otherwise, but despite pouring millions of dollars into it, a very motivated fossil fuel industry has not shown a credible alternative case. The best they have been able to do is create the illusion of greater uncertainty than there is.
Bottom line, you will always be able to interject uncertainty into the debate, but generally that is by using the disingenuous techniques you have used in this thread. Using data that is not on point, throwing up your arms and claiming that individual studies must be biased even though many studies, performed by scientists using different techniques and from different disciplines keep coming to similar conclusions and continually claiming lack of consensus. That however is not science, that is using cherry picked data to fit either your preconceived notions or a narrative you have decided to espouse for whatever reason that may be.
Unlike sitting around a bar spouting opinions as facts, science is subject to rigorous peer-review. That pretty much negates your concern about unfiltered bias.
Yesterday, here in south-Central Kansas, we had 7 1/2 inches within a 12 hour period. This has been happening with an increased frequency. Luckily, here locally, most of the wheat has been harvested. We live just north of a large earthen dam-built to protect Wichita, 30 miles to the south of us, from these weather events. Likely 1/3 of our little 55 acre farm is under water. I believe all our sheep and cattle followed their instincts and got to high ground before it was too late.
The ICE AGE IS COMING! Wait, that was the decades ago.
The hole in the ozone layer is going to kill us all! Until it didn't.
Chicken Little syndrome.
You are aware that the hole in the ozone layer was addressed by reducing the use of CFCs and HFCs? And contrary to all of the fear mongering, we still have air conditioning, asthmatics still have inhalers and on and in.
History has shown us that the biggest fear mongers tend to be the ones who say we can’t solve a problem because it will hurt their bottom line.
"We were in a moderate drought only a few days ago." Yes, it was unseasonably dry just recently. Thanks for pointing out more evidence of climate change.
In June 1968, Ann Arbor received a similar huge dumping of rain that caused a lot more damage. Several dams along the Huron were either severely damaged or destroyed including Gallup and Argo. The rebuilding of the dams eventually led to the creation of the extensive Gallup Park with large water areas we see today. Fortunately, the new dams were designed to be able to withstand the pressure from extreme flooding. They might get a test this week though.
Reports of 6.50" near Grosse Pointe located east of I-94 and closer to Moross. Pittsfield Twp just SE of Ann Arbor exceeded 4" of rain. Rainfall amounts can hugely vary from one square mile to the next. I looked at the the ground truth reports which closely matched the Doppler Radar estimates across SE MI.
Keep an eye out for more rain the rest of this weekend.
Yes, it can vary A LOT from one location to the next. We live outside Ann Arbor to the SW and the rainfall last night wasn't nearly as much as reported further south and east from here. We still got a lot in total yesterday though.
My in-laws who we are staying with happen to live on Moross in Grosse pointe. It’s real bad. I’ve been storing a lot of my Michigan memorabilia here for the last few years. Two whole storage containers got full of water. Three frames posters all soaked through. We’re waiting on family to bring over a shop vac and dehumidifier. Gonna be a days job cleaning this shit up.
For some dumb reason I left my drawer of important documents in the basement. Goodbye marriage license, car title, passports, etc.
You have my sympathy. Flooded basements suck.
Well it’s about to get a lot worse.
Lots of friends affected by this. Hang in there.
Does anyone know how this compares to a few years back when 696 was flooded all the way up to the bottom of the overpasses?
We shall see as it will rain every day for a week.
I remember people clearing out basements, everything on the curb, and a fight with FEMA for resources to help. Insane that this has happened twice in a decade.
Insane or entirely forseeaable? Plenty of people have been explaining for years that extreme weather events will only become more common as climate change gets worse.
We had an opportunity to prevent disaster, but it would’ve cost money, and delusion is free in the short term. The choice was obvious!
We definitely waited longer than we needed to, to start digging ourselves out of this hole. It is crazy to me that companies in the US investing billions in new coal less than a decade ago, We almost definitely could have avoided some of our emissions this century and been further ahead on mitigation. I doubt that even the most realistic action we could have taken would have resulted in lower peak emissions then where we are today. But there is little doubt that we resigned ourselves to higher peak emissions, higher total emissions and a later peak than was necessary. Unfortunately our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren will almost certainly pay for that shortsightedness.
The max precip area directly hit that 696 corridor. This precip event struck along and south of I-94 with the max area several miles to the SE of the 696 event.
In the few days, NWS White Lake will have the map of the precip rainfall totals across Metro Detroit. You can monitor that at weather.gov/dtx and it would be posted on their home page.
So did they ever fix the pumps that people had raided for copper scrap?
Guessing "not all of them"