Will climate change cause a repeat of the Great Flood of 1862 in California?
Scientists warn of a repeat of the 1862 flood in which millions of people would be displaced and some urban centers will be left completely submerged.
California could be facing a mega-storm that could provoke a devastating flood similar to the one that struck the state in 1862. According to scientific research, in a “plausible worst case scenario” it is very likely that such a mega-storm would originate in the Pacific, near Hawaii, and then move west.
It is not known exactly when such a mega-storm could potentially reach California, but it is expected that tropical air around the equator and atmospheric currents will cause large clouds of water vapor and send them towards the west coast of the United States. The plume of steam could be be hundreds of kilometers wide and nearly 2,000 kilometers long.
When this moisture reaches California it will hit the mountains and rise, cooling them down and opening the door to exceptionally heavy precipitation. The storm will carry so much water that, if it were to turn to liquid, the flow would be 26 times greater than that which the Mississippi River discharges into the Gulf of Mexico.
Catastrophic consequences
The Great Flood of 1862 came after 30 consecutive days of rain that poured 10 feet (3m) of rain and snow on California over a period of 43 days. Such was the power of the rainfall that it changed the course of the Los Angeles River.
According to the study, published in Science, if a storm like this were to occur, millions of people would be displaced, there would be nearly $1 billion of economic losses incurred, major interstate highways would be cut off and population centers such as Stockton or Fresno would be completely submerged.
According to the research, this type of rain will become much more commonplace in the future due to the impact of climate change: “We find that climate change has already increased the risk of a GF1862-like megaflood scenario in California, but that future climate warming will likely bring about even sharper risk increases,” the study concludes
“More rain in general, more intense rain and stronger winds”
“In the future scenario, the sequence of storms is greater in almost all aspects,” says Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at UCLA and co-author of the article, who explained that under the model “there is more rain in general, more intense rain per hour and stronger winds.”