Wet winter eases California drought, giving way to spring flood risks
Send a link to a friend
[March 17, 2023]
By Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The mixed blessing of California's exceptionally
wet winter is likely to play out this spring with somewhat heightened
flood risks in a state left largely drought free for the first time in
three years, U.S. government forecasters reported on Thursday.
The higher odds of minor to moderate flooding across most of California
from rain and runoff of melting mountain snow this spring is roughly in
line with forecasts for much of the U.S., according to the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
It also illustrates a dramatic swing in weather conditions for a state
that has been preoccupied with drought, heat and wildfires for much of
the past three years.
"Climate change is driving both wet and dry extremes," NOAA
Administrator Rick Spinrad said in a statement.
The agency's spring outlook shows 44% of the U.S. as a whole faces a
greater-than-50% chance of flooding in April, May and June, mostly east
of the Mississippi River and the bulk of it classified as minor, meaning
with little or no serious property damage likely.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2019/Sep/05/images/ads/current/stclara_lda_SPONSOR_090519.png)
"We're not calling for catastrophic and major widespread flooding," said
Ed Clark, director of NOAA's National Water Center.
Still, NOAA projects that 6.4 million people are at risk of "moderate
flooding," defined as when some structures and roads near overflowing
streams end up under water, with scattered evacuations to higher ground.
A large zone over central California and eastern Nevada accounts for
most of that moderate flood risk, along with smaller scattered regions
across the upper Midwest, NOAA said.
A comparatively small region, and home to some 1.4 million people, along
the upper Mississippi from Minneapolis south to the Iowa-Missouri border
faces a higher probability of major flooding, a catastrophic event in
which inundation of buildings and roads is extensive and evacuations are
widespread, NOAA concluded.
[to top of second column]
|
![](../images/031723PIX/news_f7.jpg)
A view of furniture and belongings left
out to dry, as residents recover from major flooding caused by
recent winter storms that hit the Central Valley, in Woodlake,
California, U.S., March 16, 2023. REUTERS/Zaydee Sanchez
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Mar/17/images/ads/current/fcs_funeral_lda_border_04029022.png)
It was that level of extreme flooding that devastated an entire
community of migrant farm workers last weekend when a levee failed
along the Pajaro River in Monterey, California.
California's winter was marked by a punishing succession of
so-called atmospheric river storms, the product of vast, dense
airborne currents of water vapor funneled in from the tropical
Pacific.
The storms have unleashed widespread flooding, mudslides, power
outages, fallen trees, surf damage, road wash-outs and evacuations
since late December. More than 20 deaths statewide have been
attributed to the onslaught.
But those storms also replenished California's sorely depleted
network of reservoirs and its Sierra Nevada mountain snowpack, a
critical source of water for the state.
"Winter precipitation, combined with recent storms, wiped out
exceptional and extreme drought in California for the first time
since 2020, and is expected to further improve drought conditions
this spring," NOAA said.
The drought picture elsewhere in the West had also improved, NOAA
said, including the Colorado River Basin, where the winter snowpack
ranges from 110% to 150% of average, Clark said. Runoff of melting
snow over the next three months is expected to boost unregulated
river flows enough to push several major reservoirs on the Colorado,
including Lake Powell, to well above normal.
Still, Clark said the Colorado basin, critical to the water supplies
of seven U.S. Western states and Mexico, has "long way to go" before
it turns to robust levels last seen in the late 1990s.
(Reporting by Steve Gorman; Editing by Robert Birsel)
[© 2023 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Mar/17/images/ads/current/charrons_bch_2022.png) |