America’s Dangerous Floods Could Move To Eastern US

A new analysis shows that the effects of “atmospheric rivers” could move from the West Coast of America to the Southeast, and move quickly. The flood consequences will be tremendous, the same analysis shows.

A new research paper in the journal Climate and Atmospheric Science titled “Opposing trends in winter Atmospheric River over the Western and Eastern US during the past four decades,” shows conditions in the western US have moved toward drought. Atmospheric rivers have started to significantly affect states in the East. “A decline in AR activity over WUS contributes to a drying trend, while notable increases over EUS foster a wetter climate.” (WUS=western US, and EUS means eastern US)

Gulf Of Mexico

Much of the wet weather in the East will come from a warming in the Gulf of Mexico. Some days that surface water has a temperature of nearly 90 degrees F. This warming water has fed storms which include Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton, each of which became a violent storm in a matter of less than two days. 

As is the case with most scientific papers, this one comes with hedging by the authors. They say, however, that the trend is strong.

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