Saturday, April 9, 2011

North Dakota's Red River's 2nd 100 year flood in 3 years?

The Red River has already surpassed flood stage (18ft / 5.5m), which makes it 19 years straight.

And in fact, it has already reached the 100 year stage (38.2ft / 11.64m), currently at 38.71ft / 11.81m, expected to crest at 38.8ft / 11.83m.

Which begs the question: is global warming effectively creating a new normal?

The 100+ year data shows a growing annual divergence as well as higher peak waterflow, each decade (probably would make sense to have a 5-year rolling average graph to illustrate this divergence, but eh...NOT MY JOB!)  That's okay...as we know, there is no such thing as global warming -- this is just natural cyclical phenomenon and not nature's response to human-generated changes, right?

So if these floods are not generated by global warming (and will therefore eventually subside), at what point do we - American taxpayers - stop paying out disaster relief funds for these annual reoccurring floods?  If the floods keep coming year after year, shouldn't towns pay into their own defensive flood walls, or move their towns out of FEMA's 500 year flood plain?



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