A couple hundred daily snowfall records were set, along with over 500 daily precipitation records, in the last days of January. Ten or more inches of snow fell in large parts of Wisconsin and Michigan along with smaller areas in Minnesota and Ohio Most of the northern two-thirds of the region received snow. A few locations in western Iowa and Minnesota received below normal totals but widespread areas of the Midwest received more than twice their normal precipitation with some areas on either side of Lake Michigan topping 500% of normal ( Figure 2). The largest amounts were in west central Lower Michigan where precipitation totals topped 3 inches. Precipitation totals exceeded an inch for areas south and east of a line from the western edge of Upper Michigan to Kansas City, Missouri. The National Weather Service June forecast predicts a 50% chance for above normal rain in June.The last 10 days of January brought abundant precipitation to most of the region And the forecast doesn’t offer much comfort.
With already saturated ground and reservoirs that are still mostly full, even a normal amount of rain in June could bring back flooding. While the drier weather has provided much needed respite for people with flooded fields and basements, the chance for even more flooding persists. The first week of June has been much drier than May and has allowed stream and reservoir levels to slowly drop back down. While it’s still too early to assess overall impacts, experts say there will likely be extensive erosion and sedimentation issues from the increased flows. Fifteen sites were above flood stage for at least 20 days. Reservoirs including Tuttle Creek Lake, Perry Lake, Milford Lake, and Cheney Lake came near to or exceeded their capacity.īetween April 29 and June 3, 104 of 136 streamgages in the state exceeded flood stage. Geological Survey’s Kansas Water Science Center has ever seen. The amount of water moving through the system was as high as anything the U.S. With much of the ground already saturated from April showers, most of it ended up in a Kansas river or stream, making pit stops in flood control reservoirs along its way downstream toward the Mississippi River and Gulf of Mexico.
At the extremes, southeast Kansas stations averaged 17 inches of rain for the month, while west central Kansas stations averaged only 5.31 inches, which is still 175% of normal rainfall for the region in May.Īll of the rain has to go somewhere. The rainfall was uneven across the state, but followed typical patterns - drier in the west, wetter in the east. Volunteer weather watchers with the Community Collaborative Rain Hail and Snow Network station in Rose Hill, just south of Wichita, took top honors, recording more than 30 inches of rain in the month of May. In addition, 19 weather stations in the state recorded monthly totals of more than 20 inches of rain. Two hundred daily records, meaning the most amount of rain to ever fall on a particular day, were also set. In the northeast corner of the state, Horton also set a 24-hour rainfall record: 9.42 inches on May 24. On May 8, 8.22 inches of rain were measured in the south central Kansas town of Wellington, besting the previous record for rainfall in a 24-hour period of 6.52 inches set on June 21, 1942. The prolonged period of rain also helped set several local records. The previous record was set in June 1951. In fact, it was the wettest month ever recorded - period.
0 kommentar(er)
