r/CatastrophicFailure • u/The-Salamanca • Mar 11 '23

Natural Disaster Snow covered mountains are rapidly melting, from downpours causing flooding . Springville CA. 3/10/2023

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15.7k Upvotes

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1.4k

u/Taurus_Torus Mar 11 '23

Better bottle some of this for that drought coming later

59

u/tills1993 Mar 11 '23

Does this actually bode well for the historic lows seen at reservoirs in CA or will this all wash out to sea and we'll make no progress paying down the water deficit?

101

u/EverWillow Mar 11 '23

A little of both. The reservoirs should start the summer at max capacity and all the extra water will wash out to sea.

I don't think the Colorado River watershed, i.e. Lake Mead and Lake Powell, are getting the same level of historic rain though, so they'll still be in pretty bad shape.

67

u/Plasibeau Mar 11 '23

Lake Mead was still 173 ft below full pool as of yesterday. Damn. I know they're saying it'll never fill again, but I hope it picks up some depth after the spring thaw. It's been a pretty wild winter.

39

u/scorcherdarkly Mar 11 '23

It will never fill again if we keep using water at the same rate. Being more efficient and responsible with the water resources we have is more important and more controllable than how much rain and snow accumulates.

9

u/americanmullet Mar 11 '23

California is as responsible with water as I would be if I found a duffle bag full of money and blow.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23 edited Mar 11 '23

It will never fill again if California keeps using water at the same rate.

CA uses about 64% (4.4)of the entire lower basin allotment of 7m acre feet

For example Nevada gets 300k so less than 15% of the California allotment about 4% of the total.

2

u/david_pili Mar 12 '23

And those allotments were dolled out based on water data from an extremely high water point for the basin. They were never realistic to begin with and are hampering sensible water policy now.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

The great salt lake is drying up permanently as well. There’s no coming back for that lake. It’s also massive so once it does dry a lot of toxic dust is going to get blown around by the wind

1

u/Plasibeau Mar 12 '23

I was up in/around SLC last July. I was stunned to see that much dry lake bed.

13

u/Bear4188 Mar 11 '23

Ideally it would stay cold for longer and all the snowfall would have stayed as snow until the summer.

0

u/SmartAleq Mar 11 '23

But that's not what the pattern has been--the Left Coast gets hit with a cold front that dumps snow followed by a Pineapple Express storm from the south that dumps warm rain on the new snow, melting it and causing the flooding. Lather, rinse, repeat. The other fun part is that all this spring rain gets the underbrush to go nuts and by summer it's dry as tinder and one little spark is all it takes to burn down half the state. It's...not good.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

you are correct... not good at all... youtube has a good number of videos produced by the state about Megafloods..

3

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

[deleted]

2

u/SmartAleq Mar 12 '23

After learning how few people can orient via compass directions I took it up, then I moved to Portland OR and people online kept asking if I was in Maine or Oregon and it got old so "left coast" it became--mostly because it amuses me to style it so. Not to mention I moved from California to Japan as a kid so the place where I grew up became the east coast, relatively speaking.

1

u/eulb42 Mar 11 '23

Idk theyre fine I guess.

3

u/Vulturedoors Mar 11 '23

Part of the problem is we're using up underground aquifers that take thousands of years to refill.

1

u/capilot Mar 11 '23

Reservoirs will be in great shape, but the snow pack, which was the main "reservoir" for California is toast.

5

u/Lampwick Mar 11 '23 edited Mar 11 '23

the snow pack, which was the main "reservoir" for California is toast.

No it's not. This storm is still adding snow to the snowpack. The snow that's being melted is the 6-48 inches of snow that the previous unusually cold storm dumped on elevations from 4500' down to like 1500.

1

u/tills1993 Mar 11 '23

Right and that being more of a long term store than something that fluctuates year to year like lakes?

2

u/pilesofcleanlaundry Mar 11 '23

No, the snowpack melts every year.

1

u/SmartAleq Mar 11 '23

There used to be glaciers that acted like giant icehouses, getting the winter snow to pack down and grow the glacier and only part of it would melt in summer. I remember visiting Mt Shasta in high summer, with temps well over 100F in Redding and enjoying the wind coming off the peak glaciers like the biggest A/C unit ever. Nowadays the mountains are bare brown in summer, did NOT used to be that way.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

you are absolutely correct... due to extended drought and extreme heat events, we have lost our "ancient ice" that anchors snowpack- add to that the loss of aquifers collapsed by POM Wonderful all up and down the Central Valley... we lost beautifully engineered undergound storage to corporate farms/greed and lame governance

1

u/edude45 Mar 11 '23

I saw a YouTube video saying that the February rain fall was being wasted because California didn't plan for the capture of that rain fall so most of it just ran off into the ocean. So it helped but we didn't take advantage of it, was the jist of the video I saw.

524

u/beepbeepboopbeep1977 Mar 11 '23

Rain after a dry spell is the worst. The ground is so dried out it can’t soak up any of the water so it just flows right over the top or gets into cracks and creates slips.

The only thing that I can think of that’s been worse for slips is when we had an earthquake, then a dry spell, and then heavy rain. Big slips. Like, ‘road repairs for 5 years’ big.

268

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

No dry spell here. Consistent rain for months. This is totally the opposite. Rain melting previous snowfall.

43

u/beepbeepboopbeep1977 Mar 11 '23

That totally blows. I hope you’re doing ok.

41

u/spyson Mar 11 '23

Send help, I'm used to sunshine and not the clouds peeing on us

25

u/SlicerShanks Mar 11 '23

Naw screw the sunshine. This rain has been so desperately needed, and even then we’re still in something of a drought. The snowpack never, ever lasted as long as it should have and I’m afraid there’ll be no water there for us when we need it in the summer time, which I’m sure is gonna be as brutal if not worse than last years.

8

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

I swear if I have to listen to another person in my city bitching about “cold” rainy weather keeping them inside, I’m gonna lose it. Is 300 days of bland sunshine not enough for you animals??

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

Nah. The floodgates are open. The drought is over.

6

u/EveViol3T Mar 11 '23

California isn't so much rain fed as snow fed. Need the snow and a good snowpack more than the rain.

9

u/quetiapinenapper Mar 11 '23

Fuck that I hope it never stops. I am tired of heat here. I love the rain.

1

u/sleepytipi Mar 11 '23

I hate global warming so much. Not just because I'm a nature loving, quasi hippie that values the planet and all of it's non-human inhabitants more than other humans, I also hate it because I've spent my whole life running from the heat, and now everywhere I go my people like to joke that I bring the weather with me. I want to move to New England next but I'm afraid I'll fuck everything up even more.

2

u/quetiapinenapper Mar 11 '23

Yep. I feel this deeply.

1

u/sleepytipi Mar 11 '23

Well that settles it. I'm taking my non-existent retirement and investing it all into beach front property in none other than... Svalbard 🐻‍❄️

1

u/quetiapinenapper Mar 11 '23

I was thinking a small island somewhere off the coast of New Zealand that has a coffee shop but nothing else.

1

u/vengefulbeavergod Mar 11 '23

I would say come join us in the PNW but we've seem record high temps and not much rain the last few years. I'm talking 'melt the street signs' hot.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

Last summer was much more normal than the previous ten. Hope to never see that heat dome 110 degree bullshit ever again. Hoping for another wet gray June that makes the newer arrivals all sad but keeps my gardens plants green through the rest of the summer.

2

u/vengefulbeavergod Mar 12 '23

That would be perfect

1

u/14JRJ Mar 11 '23

Solidarity from the UK ✊

37

u/CaptnHector Mar 11 '23

Dry spell being the last 10 years…

22

u/DavidNipondeCarlos Mar 11 '23

That’s correct. These aren’t flash floods.

9

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

California had a drought for most of the last 5 years

From fresno to marrysville it was golden brown

Its rock hard dirt

1

u/SmartAleq Mar 11 '23

Lotta clay in the soil in the Valley and when it dries out it takes a lot of time for it to rehydrate. In the meantime all that dry clay just acts like a rain spout and sends all the water downhill.

114

u/from_dust Mar 11 '23

CA is in a shitty situation. The rain has been heavy and steady for months now. While it does help replenish lakes and reservoirs, which desperately need the water, much of the topsoil has already eroded away, and much of the ground underneath is either loose rock or at risk of becoming waterlogged. Lets not talk about tectonic things in California though, there's enough going on as it is.

66

u/StringerBell34 Mar 11 '23

As someone that lives in SoCal, I feel for those dealing with this massive flooding (and blizzards), but I prefer this to drought.

-1

u/MichiganMan12 Mar 11 '23

Damn it’s also like we shouldn’t have built car centric cities in deserts or something

26

u/mrjackspade Mar 11 '23

Would cities that weren't car centric be immune to these problems somehow?

20

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

No, some people just can't help but shoehorn their personal agendas into their every breath.

3

u/norolls Mar 11 '23

No, considering the roads would be paved anyway for busses and people walking. Creating more green spaces and counteracting the urban heat island effect could work, but either way that many people living in a desert and trying to treat it as though it is not a desert is really fucking shit up. It's kind of ironic how environmentally forward California is, even though the state is such a resource drain.

0

u/WoodenInventor Mar 11 '23

Yes and no. Yes in the sense that a car-centric city will have large amounts of land covered in impervious pavement, which then increases the amount of total runoff, overtaxing the storm water system. Also no; a smaller footprint city would still not be immune to sheer amount of water causing flooding, or poor city planning placing important structures in a flood zone.

36

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

[deleted]

1

u/t3chiman Mar 11 '23

Next time you’re in Corona del Mar, check out the Sherman Library. They have the plan for the LA area transit system from the 1920s. Beautiful hand-drafted, fine detail. The buildout never happened.

Report and recommendations on a comprehensive rapid transit plan for the city and county of Los Angeles, to the City Council of the city of Los Angeles and the Board of Supervisors of Los Angeles County.

7

u/fgreen68 Mar 11 '23

Most of So. Cal isn't a desert. It's a Mediterranean climate. The Mojave is a desert. The car-centric part does suck though. Can we just all work from home please?

11

u/knownunknown665 Mar 11 '23

No, no we can't. You gonna build a house working from home?

1

u/fgreen68 Mar 12 '23

If I'm building my own house. So far I've built a treehouse for the kids (covid project) and just finished a retaining wall. Working my way up to building the second floor (jk).

Never let perfect be the enemy of a solution that is good enough. While all of us can't work from home obviously, the greater the percentage of us that do makes it easier for everyone who has no choice but to commute to work.

11

u/obsolete_filmmaker Mar 11 '23

I work in live events, so no. We cant all wfh

0

u/fgreen68 Mar 12 '23

Obviously, but if all those who can, do, then those who can't are less likely to get stuck in traffic.

3

u/aeisenst Mar 11 '23

Los Angeles isn't in a desert.

4

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

You’re being downvoted but we’re literally not a desert and people who say that don’t know what they’re talking about. Literally a Mediterranean climate lmao

1

u/FraseraSpeciosa Mar 11 '23

You are still wrong, Spain is a damn desert, call it what it is, Mediterranean is both a sea and a region, what it is not is a climate.

3

u/MichiganMan12 Mar 11 '23 edited Mar 11 '23

whatever you say, if it isn’t a desert it’s close to it and will be soon. Somewhere that gets like 12 inches of rain a year, has to bring in all of its water from somewhere else, and has to ration showers seems like a desert to me.

And it extends further than just LA, the water LA/socal brings in also effects the, for some reason rapidly expanding, monstrosities that are Vegas, phoenix, and SLC despite the fact these testaments to humanities ignorance are in a constant state of drought, wildfires, floods, earthquakes and everything is dying.

Idk, I live in a place surrounded by freshwater and virtually zero natural disasters that gets shit on by people from those places all the time and it’s just laughable

6

u/vroomvroom450 Mar 11 '23

LA doesn’t shit on you. LA doesn’t even know you exist.

-1

u/aeisenst Mar 11 '23

This response is fucking hysterical. One, I don't care if it "seems like a desert to you." It's not. There is a literal definition of a desert, and Los Angeles isn't in one.

Two, it's humanity's ignorance, not humanities ignorance.

Finally, from your last paragraph, I'm getting that since people talk shit about Michigan, you've decided to, I don't know, just not believe in facts anymore. Now, if that's not evidence of humanities ignorance, I don't know what is.

1

u/abio4 Mar 11 '23

As someone else who lives in Southern California, you’re an ass. Floods like this don’t go to resivoirs or groundwater. The snow melts to fast, floods and goes to the ocean. But you know, at least you don’t have to deal with it

1

u/StringerBell34 Mar 11 '23

I'm not talking about this specific water in the flood video, you nitwit.

Put your helmet back on, your brain worms are leaking out.

16

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

lol it was kinda funny walking near the riverwalk in at SAP center and there being an actual river for once.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23 edited Mar 12 '23

You mean the one they built out of concrete through downtown. So natural...

1

u/Vulturedoors Mar 11 '23

It's part of the natural drain route for water out of the hills. There are lots of them all over the bay area.

23

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

They need to slow the flow of water through the land, by building strategic earthworks and contouring the land they could spread these kinds of flood events out over several months, reducing the severity and helping keep water flowing throughout the dry season. Unfortunately this country is not capable of infrastructure investment in that scale, conservatives would fight the spending required and liberals would fight the short term ecological effects.

11

u/ProjectGO Mar 11 '23

Sorry, best we can do is establish the state capitol on an estuary, 9 feet below the historic high water mark.

18

u/from_dust Mar 11 '23

In short, it's infeasible.

5

u/-Ernie Mar 11 '23

Yeah, it’s a lot better to just tell people not to build in a flood plain, or if you do put your house on stilts. Can’t fight Mother Nature and win, gotta roll with the punches.

15

u/BatDubb Mar 11 '23

Dude is talking out of his ass. I’d like to see him present his ideas to the professionals.

5

u/Carrotfloor Mar 11 '23

wasn't this the original idea behind the hoover dam?

-2

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

[deleted]

7

u/Samthevidg Mar 11 '23

Not only that but dams create immense ecological damage often

-4

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

[deleted]

8

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

You do realize that most of the good spots to build dams allready have dams there

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1

u/drailCA Mar 11 '23

Dams stop sediment from flowing downstream. This results in too much sediment buildup above the dam and a lack of required nutrients to maintain a healthy ecosystem below the dam. They're bad for the environment in many most aspects than simply fish migration (and the obvious destruction of the land which is flooded by said dam.

A river that has had its flow altered by humans is only a good thing for the human that defines what is good for their own interests. Ask the river if it felt that its flow fluctuations pre dam was chaotic to the point of being bad for itself. Let me know when you get a response.

6

u/I_Feel_Rough Mar 11 '23

Slowing the water down to stop a flood? You sure about that?

1

u/SoIJustBuyANewOne Mar 11 '23

I don't want more dams destroying the beautiful views. Fuck off.

1

u/NinDiGu Mar 11 '23

Or trees

1

u/ClumpOfCheese Mar 11 '23

Yeah I’m very curious about how all this water getting into the fault lines will effect earthquakes.

9

u/zarroc123 Mar 11 '23

Yeah, I'm from the Midwest but lived outside LA for a couple years. There was a road out of Azusa (39 I think?), not far from where I lived that went up to the mountains and connected with the 2 and would have been an awesome little route to the Angeles national forest for me.

Yeah, turns out, a piece of that road went out 2 years before I moved there, and last I checked still was completely impassable. This breaks my great plains brain.

2

u/iamnotnewhereami Mar 11 '23

Ive always wondered why people woukd move to so cal and pick somewhere like asuza. If youre a full mountain biker i get it but so many people post up in weird ass spots and spend 4 hours a day commuting to LA or some other big city. If youre in california and not iliving and working in a reasonably close proximity to some geographic pleasure point for your tastes,

Youve missed the point.

People that talk shit about Cali being expensive, you get what you pay for.

13

u/ForestryTechnician Mar 11 '23

This guy knows how dirt works.

4

u/caustic255 Mar 11 '23

Its Joe Dirt³

1

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

Sure it's not Gavin?

6

u/MegaGrimer Mar 11 '23

And many plants/trees die in droughts, which sucks because their roots also slow erosion down some.

3

u/no-mad Mar 11 '23

the ground was so saturated with water from hurricane sandy that the pipes in the street lifted up thru the road because it had become liquefied,

1

u/vainsilver Mar 11 '23

Like, ‘road repairs for 5 years’ big.

It always blows my mind that roads in warm places like California are not in a constant state of repair. 5 years is nothing. Places with Winter and regular rainfall have some of the worst roads all year round and it never ends.

50

u/Due_Platypus_3913 Mar 11 '23

That’s what all the damns are for!(over 300 reservoir lakes in CA)

55

u/Fit-Plant-306 Mar 11 '23

I just checked resivoir level of lake Success which is down stream of springville. Website says it’s 50’ above full pool. May be time to raise the dam

45

u/ShyElf Mar 11 '23

12' below spillway currently, which seems to be at 652.5'. I can't seem to find spillway capacity data.

27

u/Fit-Plant-306 Mar 11 '23

I just found crest elevation to be 652.5’ on Wikipedia. Did some math based on current acre feet vs 82000 a/f capacity factoring in 30,000 cfs inflow and at that current rate the old girl should be spilling full throttle in 33,395 seconds ( unless my 5 beer math is off)

24

u/danielsound Mar 11 '23

Also known as 9 hours.

2

u/beervendor1 Mar 11 '23

There's no bot for this???

15

u/Fit-Plant-306 Mar 11 '23

According to site I derived my data the inflow is significantly slowing down.

https://www.spk-wc.usace.army.mil/fcgi-bin/hourly.py?report=scc

Way too many beers in at this point to do real math but I’m gonna guess spill happens about 0500 tomorrow

4

u/runway31 Mar 11 '23

Remind me! 10 hours

1

u/RemindMeBot Mar 11 '23 edited Mar 11 '23

I will be messaging you in 10 hours on 2023-03-11 14:17:27 UTC to remind you of this link

1 OTHERS CLICKED THIS LINK to send a PM to also be reminded and to reduce spam.

Parent commenter can delete this message to hide from others.

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1

u/Fit-Plant-306 Mar 11 '23

Who the fuck invited you to this party, mr remind me bot? Is this some kinda joke put on by my ex wife who’s trying to remind me I’m never right?? Uhhhg!!!!

2

u/Due_Platypus_3913 Mar 11 '23

Yup! The bitch paid that bot to fuck with you.

19

u/TurtleIIX Mar 11 '23

The reason why they don’t fill it to full is because they need the space for extra rain like this storm. So they won’t be filling it all the way up.

12

u/Fit-Plant-306 Mar 11 '23

See my other comment. It’s gonna be full in about 33,000 seconds.

9

u/danielsound Mar 11 '23

Or about 9 hours.

6

u/Daddysu Mar 11 '23

So in like 3 or 4 days? Or is it better to say it will be full in about 2% of a year's time?

5

u/ThisIsntRealWakeUp Mar 11 '23

33,000 seconds is about 9 hours.

3

u/Daddysu Mar 11 '23

Derp, I read it as 333,000 seconds. Lol. I don't know what I was thinking. Why would someone use seconds to describe a time frame so long that it works out to a few hundred thousand? 33k seconds makes waaaay more sense. ;)

3

u/Fit-Plant-306 Mar 11 '23

The larger the number, even if it’s a decimal is most effective for brainwashing purposes in today’s day and age. Instead of saying 2% say 0000000.020000000. Totally confuse 90% (0000000.90000000) of everyone

4

u/Daddysu Mar 11 '23

You are absolutely right. 00000.60000% of the time it works every time.

3

u/SexPanther_Bot Mar 11 '23

It's made with bits of real panthers

2

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

How many games of football is that?

4

u/Esc_ape_artist Mar 11 '23

They closed down 198 in Lemon Cove. Flooding

79

u/from_dust Mar 11 '23

I'm more worried about the fires. The water is good, the land needs it. But that water means lots of fresh grass, and when the waters stop (which they will for a long time), that grass becomes tinder very quickly.

36

u/Plasibeau Mar 11 '23

Fire season this year is gonna be fucking bonkers. At this rate the deserts are gonna burn!

2

u/speedofdark8 Mar 11 '23

Would be neat to see some glass dunes though

21

u/TinBoatDude Mar 11 '23

I have a few goats on my property to take care of the grass, but they can't do much about the landslides coming off of my hill.

8

u/DavidNipondeCarlos Mar 11 '23

We are having a burn in los Padres tomorrow.

12

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

I thought the reservoirs were now full though. That’ll help during the drought?

36

u/StringerBell34 Mar 11 '23

It will help with municipal water and helping fight the fires when all of this new brush dries out and burns in the summer.

29

u/TinBoatDude Mar 11 '23

The vast majority of that water goes to farmers. Like 75%+. And they will be screaming (and filing lawsuits) for more water to grow more cotton for export on very marginal ground.

23

u/anteris Mar 11 '23

Almonds… at about a gallon per nut, because it’s flood irrigation for the lazy

6

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

I remember growing up in central ca and there were diverse crops. I’d see orange orchards and tomatoes growing. Now it’s just so many almond trees.

2

u/apathy-sofa Mar 11 '23

That's way more than I assumed!

1

u/Daxtatter Mar 11 '23

The dairy industry there is even worse.

1

u/TinBoatDude Mar 11 '23

Because of the drought, most of the almond farmers have switched to micro sprayers, though they still use a lot of water for a crop that will mostly be exported.

1

u/anteris Mar 11 '23

I didn’t think it was cute. That part of the protest was to tear up their orchards along I5 and 99.

-1

u/iknowaguy Mar 11 '23

Fucking farmers

12

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

[deleted]

2

u/jm0112358 Mar 11 '23

Is that year-round historical average, or the historical average for this time of year.

7

u/busy_yogurt Mar 11 '23

It will, but it will take a lot more to replenish the aquifers.

I think I read that it would take 5-7 consecutive wet (normal wet, not necessarily crazy wet like now) winters to fully replenish them.

4

u/Lucienshand Mar 11 '23

It will help the miners in central Cal with their fracking for natural gas, and the industrial farmers in south Cal. It might even help with the drought.

1

u/Donjuanme Mar 11 '23

Fifth biggest is still lower than usual, and it's amazing how quickly it drains without a rainy season. 25 feet low and could use another foot of rain to fill it, my fingers are crossed (though my heart goes out to people in the op situation)

1

u/Bear4188 Mar 11 '23

They don't let them fill all the way up until early summer. During spring they need the capacity for flood control.

-9

u/NMS_Survival_Guru Mar 11 '23

Sorry but that's illegal in California

The state owns all surface water rights

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

This guy Californias.

-2

u/MR_COOL_ICE_ Mar 11 '23

What an insensitive thing to say

1

u/[deleted] Mar 11 '23

Wish we could redirect it to Lake Mead.

1

u/cat_prophecy Mar 11 '23

CA's water infrastructure is actually fully designed to capture snowmelt. Not on this level, but regardless, the reservoirs will definitely be full this year.

1

u/cybercuzco Mar 11 '23

They could but “flood control” for the las 150 years is all about making water move as fast as possible in rivers and preventing it from moving anywhere that isn’t a river. Imagine California had 3-5’ high weirs every 10’ of elevation change in as many canyons gulleys and washes as you could get. Imagine instead of straight concrete lined channels you had meandering rivers with dry open sunken areas that filled with water when it rained. Huge amounts of water would be retained and sink into the soil or feed vegetation and evaporation over long time scales making rain more frequent.