Earth  ID: 12129

Unseasonable Floods

Story by Ellen T. Gray | Visualizations by Horace Mitchell Released on January 19, 2016
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Heavy December rains cause substantial flooding in the U.S.
A series of winter storms brought more than 20 inches of rainfall to the Midwest and southeastern United States in December 2015. Unseasonable and severe flooding followed throughout both regions. In the Midwest, rainwater swelled the banks of rivers and tributaries that feed the Mississippi River, leading to flooding in Missouri, Illinois, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Mississippi. Alabama, Georgia and other areas in the South were hardest hit by rainstorms that arrived Christmas week. The torrential rains led to massive flooding and declarations of a state of emergency in Alabama and northern Georgia. From space, NASA's Global Precipitation Measurement mission satellites collected data on the amount of rain that fell across the U.S. in December. Watch the video to see an animation of accumulated rainfall created from satellite observations.
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This animation shows the accumulation of rainfall over the U.S. during December 2015.
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Areas of the southeastern U.S. saw up to 10 inches of rain following the first of three major storm systems in December.
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By mid-December, a second storm system dropped significant rainfall across states in the Midwest and southern U.S.
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Rainfall accumulations by month's end triggered floods in states located within and around the Mississippi-Missouri River basin (black outline).
 

Source Material

IMERG Rainfall Accumulation over the United States for December 2015

For More Information

NASA.gov

Story Credits

Lead Visualizer/Animator:
Horace Mitchell (NASA/GSFC)

Lead Scientist:
George Huffman (NASA/GSFC)

Lead Writer:
Ellen T. Gray (ADNET Systems, Inc.)

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12129

Keywords:
SVS >> App
NASA Science >> Earth