Weather fun with MATH!

[CalG]

July has been wet here. 12.9 inches so far, and we are supposed to get over an inch during the next 20 hours. Everything is green, the brooks are full, and the vernal pool out back is full and flowing.

Now the math part.

13 or 14 inches of rain is over a foot. In this state, the house and two acres is termed a homestead for tax purposes etc.

2 acres an a foot deep is 2 acre-feet of water. An acre foot is equal to somewhere near 266,000 gallons of water .

2 acres would be 532,000 gallons. round up about 20% for the 14 inches. we are looking at 600,000 gallons of fresh rain water right here at the house just during the month of July!

Seems like a lot ;-)

 

[tallyho8]

Could you ship it to California where they need it?

 

[tallyho8]

July is our rainiest month. So far it rained 16 out of 18 days this month. The weather channel says we have had 4 1/3 inches of rain this month. I have emptied a 5 gallon bucket I keep in the yard 3 times this month. I don't know where they get their measurements from but it sure ain't in this neighborhood.

 

[Cat385B]

Yeah, quit being a precipitation hog.

 

[Jstpssng]

I would love to send our next week's weather, starting with what we had today. As badly as you need the rain I don't want to say how many days we've had it so far this month... which is traditionally one of our driest.

I try not to complain about it here though, as I know how badly others would like to see something coming down.

 

[Doofy]

Wow! We have had 4" of Precipitation so far this year and have been complaining because it seems excessive. An attitude adjustment is in our future. Stay safe out there!

 

[oosik]

I haven't found out where we are in our rainfall to date. I do know we are below what is expected. We average 17 inches annually.

My lake is 10 inches lower than normal for this time of year.

 

[Doofy]

Well darn, oosik. We just had a thunder storm that dumped .87" in a couple hours. I'd send it your way if I could.

 

[oosik]

I would take a guess - we have received less than half the "normal" rainfall to date, this year.

The thing I worry about - Doofy - this fall we might get rains to make up for this shortfall. If it comes as storms - there will be serious flooding. Around here if we get one inch in 24 hours it causes significant erosion.

I look out across the lake and see water line marks on the cliffs. Calcium deposits from the hard water. Just like the rings on a bath tub, only they are bright white on the black basaltic lava cliffs. Current water level will be setting an all new low level mark.

I still have plenty of water in my spring - supplies water to the house. But, it too, is low for this time of year.

It's just a really dry year.

But let's do some math. I have five acres of open water in my lake. Five acres of cattails with an average water depth of six feet. The entire ten acres is down 10 inches.

Ten acres is - 435,600 square feet. Ten inches is 0.83 of a foot. So 435,600 x 0.83 = ~ 362,000 cu ft. There is 7.5 gallons of water per cubic foot. So ... 362,000 x 7.5 = 2,715,000 gallons.

Yes - I've lost a little water so far this year. Thank GOD - the lake is 80 feet deep.

 

[scaredychicken]

out here there is no snowpack left, the waters are low, no rain of any real measure in past 3 months, and high risk of forest fires. basically ... another year like 2017 with fire bans etc.

 

[oosik]

CalG - your calculations on a acre foot of water are a little short. On acre = 43,560 sq ft. One foot deep = 43,560 cu. ft. A cubic foot of water is roughly 7.5 gallons. 43560 cu ft x 7.5 = 326,700 gallons.

Whatever - it's a whole lot of water.

 

[scaredychicken]

all I know is that for the past 20 yrs, I have Water Rights on the creek on the property. 6,000 Litres a DAY (about 1,500 gallons daily) ... I think it is more than that actually - it's a whole lotta water, that I have not yet used.

 

[CalG]

CalG - your calculations on a acre foot of water are a little short. On acre = 43,560 sq ft. One foot deep = 43,560 cu. ft. A cubic foot of water is roughly 7.5 gallons. 43560 cu ft x 7.5 = 326,700 gallons.

Whatever - it's a whole lot of water.

I know.

I used the international unit for gallons of BEER! those are bigger, and everyone knows bigger is better.

And beer is god's way of letting us know we are supposed to be happy.

Ain't math fun!

 

[CADplans]

The article I was reading about the hundreds of human deaths in Europe was due to,,, wait for it,,

3 3/4 inches of rain,, (less than 10 CM of rain),,

That does not seem like much, I have had triple that in 24 hours at my home,
we had to regrade the gravel driveway,,

Maybe the Europe floods are not displaying much accumulation because the rain gauge is not located where it is raining??

 

[MoKelly]

I know.

I used the international unit for gallons of BEER! those are bigger, and everyone knows bigger is better.

And beer is god's way of letting us know we are supposed to be happy.

Ain't math fun!

There is an international unit for gallons of beer?

And to think I just used cases.

MoKelly

 

[ponytug]

The article I was reading about the hundreds of human deaths in Europe was due to,,, wait for it,,

3 3/4 inches of rain,, (less than 10 CM of rain),,

That does not seem like much, I have had triple that in 24 hours at my home,
we had to regrade the gravel driveway,,

Maybe the Europe floods are not displaying much accumulation because the rain gauge is not located where it is raining??

I don't think it is a missing rain gauge.

Well, there were areas with 6" of rain, some of them getting 2" of rain in an hour. Some of the footage afterwards showed flood water levels two and a half stories high, which is pretty typical of flash floods in mountains. (Altenahr, Germany) If you look at the storm path, it hit the mountains and then moved down the river valleys, adding more water to the flooding water. There are some nice radar storm maps out there.

There certainly was not a great emergency alert system in place; the Germany federal weather agency issued an alert, but left it up to the individual states to warn residents and not all of them got the warning out to the small towns.

However, given the age of many of the houses, you can say that it is a historically very uncommon event. Once in a hundred years or more. How much of it was made worse by more roads or climate change? Certainly could be, but you can say that it is historically very unusual.

All the best,

Peter

 

[CalG]

Just a comment:

When Katrina hit New England, The LAST THING on anyone's mind in my area was flooding. We were all up for high winds, power outages downed trees blocking roadways etc.

But when the wind died down. The water came.
Lives were lost in the swirling darkness.

Strange what escapes us....

 

[oosik]

Whoa there Scardychicken. That sign says - basically, I can't go "out there".

I NEVER get so much rain that it causes flooding. The spring snow melt has caused flooding around my out buildings. I have a simple cure. Three inch trash pump - over the hill and into my lake. This happens about once every ten years. The house sits high enough that these spring snow melt waters never get near it.

My most annoying situation. The wind blows - here comes the dust - so thick I can not look outside and even see my lake. I can not open the windows, turn on my big fans and cool down the house. So we sit here, sweating, until the wind quits and the dust goes away.

CalG - Well, the International Unit for Gallons of Beer - - that DOES change the calculations. My error ................

 

[turnkey4099]

I haven't found out where we are in our rainfall to date. I do know we are below what is expected. We average 17 inches annually.

My lake is 10 inches lower than normal for this time of year.

I don't have the exact firgures but we are lacking just about half of our normal precip for this year to date. We got almost zero precip during our spring wet season. That hurts when normal is only 16-17" annual. Harvest has just started, prediction is for at least 30% reduction in yeild and big drop in quality fpr the wheat crop.

 

[turnkey4099]

Whoa there Scardychicken. That sign says - basically, I can't go "out there".

Big announcemtn last night on the news. DNR has ALL DNR land East of the Cascades to the Idaho border. You are right. We can't even go out there to take a stroll.