area flooding

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

I drove back through Riverview and it was fine. Turns out the ground floor of all those apartments is all garages. So they figured on this.

My guess is they fired the architect who planned on second floor garages.

[tw]

For those attempting to understand 'whats and whys', below is the weekly rain map in inches. Left side is Ohio. Right side is Atlantic Ocean off of New Jersey. Upper right corner is New England including Maine. Viewing this picture separately in a 'picture viewer' that can zoom will make three letter city codes visible. New York City is LGA.

Mustard yellow are areas with rain above 8 inches (20 cm). It includes (south to north) Washington DC (lowest), Baltimore MD (BWI), Reading PA (RDG), and Wilkes Barre PA (AVP) (topmost). Five pockets of orange inside that mustard yellow are > 12 inches. For example, one orange pocket is Reading PA (RDG). Binghamton NY (BGM) (dead center in map) is not even in a mustard yellow area. And yet even that rain was too much for Binghamton. Lowest orange spot is in MD (Maryland) adjacent to southwest corner of DE (Delaware) and just below the words "IN INCHES". Largest orange is the upper Chesapeake Bay and bottom of the Susquehanna River in a mostly rural region of MD and PA (that might include Elkton MD).

Most rain was scattered across numerous river basins or dumped in the the upper Cheasapeake Bay. Those river basins are Susquehanna (Binghamton NY and Wilkes Barre PA), Schuykill River (Reading PA to Philadelphia), and Delaware River (entire NJ/PA border and includes Lackawaxen River). Lackawaxen is unique since its entire flow is controlled by a dam that created Lake Wallenpaupak. I watched. They were flowing water through that Wallenpaupak electric generating station all day. More may have been released previously via emergency release chutes in April 2005 (an unannounced manmade flood) that created serious Upper Delaware River damage.

Pictures provided by UT are along Schuykill River that passes from Reading PA in an ESE direction towards Philadelphia (PHL) where rainfall was less than 8 inches (dark green and light green). Generally, anyone flooded by this rain should not be living in that too low area. This was not the Big One; only an unusually large rainfall and not unusually large for areas such as Binghamton NY.

For residents in Yardley PA on the Delaware River, this is the third flood in what - five years? Begs why are they living there. Delaware River received very little rainfall compared to a Big One.

Furthermore, large rainfall areas were distributed among many different river basins. Had that large yellow mustard area moved either west or east, then the Susquehanna or Schuykill River basins would have actually suffered flooding.

[xoxoxoBruce]

The Schuykill River at Philly is draining 1,890 sq/mi.
The Delaware River at Trenton is draining 6,780 sq/mi.
The Susquehanna River at Conowingo is draining 27,100 sq/mi.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by tw

Binghamton NY (BGM) (dead center in map) is not even in a mustard yellow area. And yet even that rain was too much for Binghamton.

Please note the mustard yellow North of Binghamton. Chenango Point in Binghamton is where the Chenango joins the Susquehanna. Parts of Binghamton are low lying and never should have been built on but this storm was not "usual" if you look at the rainfall in the drainage area that is collected and goes through Bing.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Griff

Please note the mustard yellow North of Binghamton. Chenango Point in Binghamton is where the Chenango joins the Susquehanna. Parts of Binghamton are low lying and never should have been built on but this storm was not "usual" if you look at the rainfall in the drainage area that is collected and goes through Bing.

But look at all the other areas that drain through Binghamton that were not yellow. The Johnstown PA (1985?) flood was unique because almost the entire upriver drainage area got 10+ inches of rain within only hours; and all had to drain through Johnstown. Had that been same for Binghamtown, well, then flooding should be expected. This was not a Big One. This on two rivers where most of the drainage area did not suffer 'yellow' rainfall - and still the river basin in Binghamton was too narrow.

To be a significant flood, most of both rivers above Binghamton should have been yellow rainfall. Notice that Wilke Barre and Sunbury both on the same river had less serious (near zero) problems. Wilkes Barre had mostly dark green rainfall upstream AND the flooding from Binghamton. Wilkes Barre took precautions that were mostly unnecessary.

Of course maybe the press suddenly realized after Binghamton that the flooding was really not that serious - was being overhyped. But what we have is a benchmark. Any home flooded by this lesser event should be 'corrected'. That usually means moved. Homes are the one structure that must survive catastrophic events. Businesses, rec fields, parking garages, etc are all sacrificial.

Homes should never be built where flooding will occur. Homes are the one structure we all need intact especially after such events.

[Griff]

The ground in upstate NY was already saturated before the week's rains began. I wasn't sure why you didn't want this flood to be serious, but being that it was the most serious flood in Binghamton since 1935, I suppose it must be your political agenda. You criticize the press for hyping an existing flood while pimping your future scenario in hopes of increasing Federal intervention related to climate. Please remember when you win your interventions, it will be folks with other agendas implementing them.

note: I acknowlege that Federal taxpayers spent huge sums of money to ugrade WBs flood walls recently and they did their job.

[MsSparkie]

Scroll down the page....lots of steamy weather, tornados too....

http://wwwa.accuweather.com/adcbin/p...unity_blog.asp

[Trilby]

Originally Posted by MsSparkie

...lots of steamy weather, tornados too....

O. M. G. it is soooo freakin' hot and humid here in the Miami Valley that you can't even go outside unless you are right next to the pool. It's misreable! This weather forces a person indoors. It's just too hot.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Griff

I wasn't sure why you didn't want this flood to be serious, but being that it was the most serious flood in Binghamton since 1935, I suppose it must be your political agenda.

Worse flood than 1972 Agnes? So what changed? Was it really a big flood? Was it created by man (for example in NY that may not install flood control on all new construction)? Or was it really nothing more than the local gossip hyping a story? If the flood in Binghamton was so bad, then why was it a non-event just downriver in Wilkes Barre - that does flood planning since 1972?

I see nothing that justifies all this hype. So I took an all day bike ride up towards Reading - downriver of that big orange spot. Nothing. No serious flooding. Just the usual flood plain soil replenishment and dirt where roads were too low.

If Binghamton had serious flooding, then Binghamton has serious planning and code enforcement problems in and upriver of Binghamton. Sounds like a manmade problem to me.

To repeat a primary point: where problems existed, then the town / region must fix their problems. This was not a Big One. And what I 'want' is not even stated or implied. It was only a serious flood where man has failed to act responsible - and will be worse later if what 'was only a warning' is not heeded. It was not a major news story as we all saw in national news. But then things close to NYC too often get more hype.

[Griff]

Every flooded home is by definition a man-made problem. The heaviest rains from Agnes fell mostly South of Binghamton hence the new flood wall construction in WB. I can't find information on river levels to compare. I'm really thrown by the relatively modest amount of measured rain compared to the change in river level, but I think our ground water levels are up since the rain has eased but the river is still quite high.

We do have a strip mall problem East (down stream)of Bing along the river which must have eaten up wetland. Binghamton itself was a land granted swamp originally. I wonder if certain areas are sinking? Broome County NY (Bing), has heavy code enforcement whereas Chenango County NY, has little. What I don't get is new construction in flood prone areas. When I was surveying we did flood elevations for folks looking to qualify for morgages. No elevation = no morgage. However, since they have built highways and malls along the river since the flood of '35 we may have our answer as to how this became a so-called century event, they've altered the flood plain. If this is the case it really isn't Binghamton's fault, since there is rarely new construction in Binghamton proper (shrinking population). We need to look at upstream construction like Conklin.

Any idea where we can find historical river level data on-line?

[xoxoxoBruce]

The Delaware River went down and now the hard part. Harmony, NJ started washing down the buildings with fire hoses today. The water was up to the red arrow in the second picture.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Deposit, NY on the 28th.

[lookout123]

the good news is that i am personally responsible for interviewing any folks wanting to move to flood free phoenix due to recent events. all cellarites will receive priority clearance.

[MsSparkie]

I saw a show about floods once, and they said just imagine how heavy one bucket of water is. Imagine thousands of them pushing you along in a raging flood. The power of nature.

[capnhowdy]

We had a flood here in '94. Nothing of this magnitude IRC.