Since 1980, tropical cyclones have been the costliest type of weather-related disaster in the United States, according to NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI). The NCEI study includes events that caused at least one billion dollars in damages when adjusted for inflation.
Accounting for just under a fifth (17.6%) of the total number of events, tropical cyclones have caused more than half (53.8%) of the total damages.
Tropical cyclones also cause more deaths than any other type of weather-related disaster.
Types of Events Compared
NCEI monitors the following types of disasters:
Hurricanes
Drought
Inland floods
Severe local storms
Wildfires
Crop freeze events
Winter storms
Damages Quantified
Since 1980, the U.S. has sustained at least 341 billion-dollar, weather disasters (including Consumer Price Index adjustment to 2022). The total cost of these 341 events exceeds $2.4 trillion.
Out of that total, tropical cyclones have caused a combined $1.3 trillion in total damages—with an average of $22.2 billion per event. They leave droughts in the dust. Droughts are the second costliest.
Rank ordered based on average cost per event, they line up like this:
Tropical Cyclones – $22.2 billion
Drought – $10.9 billion
Wildfires – $6.3 billion
Flooding – $4.8 billion
Winter storms – $4.3 billion
Freezes – $3.9 billion
Severe storms – $2.4 billion
The table below contains additional information about the frequency of billion dollar events, their total costs, and the number of deaths they cause.
All parts of the county experience weather-related disasters. The dominant types of disasters vary by region. For instance winter storms are more costly in the north, droughts in the plains, and tropical cyclones along seaboards.
Cost of Disasters Increasing
Both the number and cost of billion-dollar weather-related disasters are increasing over time. Here’s the breakdown by year.
Exercise caution when interpreting the upward slope of the graph above. It would be easy to attribute the slope solely to climate change and many people will,
But NCEI points out that increases in population, and material wealth over the last several decades are an important factor for higher damages. So are the locations of population concentrations and failure to adopt better building codes.
“These trends are further complicated by the fact that many population centers and infrastructure exist in vulnerable areas like coasts and river floodplains, while building codes are often insufficient in reducing damage from extreme events,” says NCEI.
Data Sources
In calculating the cost assessments, we receive input from a variety of public and private data sources including:
Insurance Services Office
Federal Emergency Management Agency
U.S. Department of Agriculture
National Interagency Fire Center
Energy Information Administration
U.S. Army Corps
State agencies
Other partners
Costs Include…
Each of these data sources provides key pieces of information that capture the total, direct costs—both insured and uninsured—of weather and climate events. These costs include:
Physical damage to residential, commercial, and government or municipal buildings
Material assets within a building
Time element losses like business interruption
Vehicles and boats
Offshore energy platforms, electrical infrastructure, military bases
Public infrastructure like roads, bridges, levees, buildings
Agricultural assets like crops, livestock, and timber
Disaster restoration and wildfire suppression costs
One of the key transformations is scaling up insured loss data to account for uninsured and underinsured losses, which differs by peril, geography, and asset class.
Costs Do Not Include…
However, these loss assessments do not take into account losses to natural capital or assets, health-care-related losses, or values associated with loss of life. Therefore, consider NCEI estimates conservative with respect to what is truly lost, but cannot be completely measured.
Posted by Bob Rehak based on Information from NCEI
2034 Days since Hurricane Harvey
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Screenshot-2023-03-25-at-8.50.23-PM.png?fit=2258%2C1204&ssl=112042258adminadmin2023-03-25 21:49:042023-03-26 09:51:05Tropical Cyclones Costliest Type of Weather-Related Disaster By Far
Have you ever flown over a winding river and wondered why rivers move? Why do they wander across the landscape and evolve the way they do? The lower Mississippi River and its delta form a spectacular example. But others are all around us.
Take, for instance, the Trinity River where it enters Galveston Bay. Or look on any map. You will likely see landscapes carved by rivers that leave evidence of their former paths behind.
But why do rivers change course? The brilliantly simple YouTube Video by Practical Engineering below describes the basics of “fluvial geomorphology.” That fancy phrase describes the science behind the shape of rivers.
Fisk produced gorgeous historical maps of the river snaking across miles of river valley.
Screen capture of historical river maps by Harold Fisk shown in Why Rivers Move by Practical Engineering Video.
A decade later, Emory Lane, a civil engineer and hydrologist at Colorado State University, went on to develop a unified theory of sediment transport. His theory explains the movement and shape of such rivers in an “equation” that uses just four variables:
Quantity of sediment carried by the water
Median sediment size
Quantity of water
Slope of the landscape (length divided by elevation change)
Lane’s “equation” looks like this.
Screen capture of Lane’s equation from Why Rivers Move by Practical Engineering.
That funny symbol in the middle means ‘is proportional to.’ Scientists use it to show something that varies in relation to something else.
If you change one variable, one or more other variables change to bring the river back to its “normal” state. Scientists and engineers still use this formula today.
It means that in a stable stream, the flow of water multiplied by the slope is proportional to the amount of sediment being transported times the size of that sediment. (But don’t let that scare you!)
From Stream-Table Models to Real World
In the abstract, that may be a lot for average people to wrap their heads around. So the video uses a “stream table” and balance-scale model to illustrate what happens when you change each variable. They bring the formula to life and make it easy to understand. For example…
More water (say, in a flood) can move more and larger sediment. So, the banks of a river erode.
This can threaten roads, pipelines, and property. The eventual deposition of all that sediment can also choke a channel and contribute to flooding. Or fill up reservoirs and reduce water supply.
Sound familiar? All those things happened in the Lake Houston area.
To restore balance, the river changes its slope by increasing its length. This explains the meanders found in most rivers in this region. A meandering river wanders back and forth across the landscape like a snake instead of making a straight line through it.
Wherever slight bends occur, the river scours the outside of the curve (called the cut bank). That’s because the water moves faster on the outside of a curve. The river then deposits larger particles of sediment on inside curves farther downriver (called point bars) where water moves slower.
Eventually these curves in a river become so exaggerated, that they cut themselves off, leaving oxbow lakes behind.
Screen capture of meandering river and oxbow lakes from Practical Engineering video.
This National Park Service page contains an excellent series of illustrations that show the evolution of meanders over time plus their migration across the landscape.
Lane’s equation predicts that there’s no such thing as a stable river. All rivers change all the time in response floods, drought, development, dams, sand mining, farming and more.
When Natural Systems Lose Balance…
At every point along a river or stream, erosion and deposition are constantly balancing each other.
But Lane’s equation can’t predict exactly where or when a river will move. Nor can it predict the rate of change. The Practical Engineering video points out that the rate and volume of change depend on other factors not in the equation, such as vegetation and the “pulsing” of flows as you might see downstream of a dam like the one on Lake Conroe.
The screen capture below shows what happened in models comparing a steady flow and a pulsed flow.
Screen capture shows erosion differences between steady flow (left) and pulsed flows (right) using the same volume of water.
The pulsed flow creates much more erosion and faster movement of channels. And that has many real world implications.
Who Should Watch This Video?
This 16-minute video is a real eye opener for a variety of audiences. It’s suitable for students from late middle school and up. You don’t need to be a math or science whiz to understand it. Its power is its simplicity.
Among students, the video may stimulate curiosity in earth sciences, engineering, math, economics, history and urban planning. And for adults, it shows how four variables tie them all together.
It makes a great tutorial for policy makers struggling with issues such as setbacks from rivers for homes and businesses.
In addition, everyone who lives near or is considering buying property near a river, stream or channel should view this.
The producers say the next video in the Why-Rivers-Move series will show how human changes affect the flow of rivers. Can’t wait!
My thanks to Dr. Matthew Berg, CEO of Simfero Consultants for bringing this to my attention.
GLO Commissioner Dawn Buckingham, M.D., announced yesterday more than $43 million in HUD grants for 44 infrastructure projects stemming from 2019 Disasters. The $43 million is the combined total of grants made to counties and cities stretching from the Rio Grande Valley to southeast Texas.
Counties where 2019 community development block grant disaster-relief (CDBG-DR) money will be distributed for infrastructure projects.
The infrastructure-project grants will help communities recover from the 2019 South Texas Floods as well as Tropical Storm Imelda, which devastated SE Texas.
List of Recipients
The funds will be used to improve streets as well as water and drainage facilities in:
Counties:
Cameron
Chambers
Harris
Hidalgo
Jefferson
Liberty
Montgomery
Orange
San Jacinto
Willacy
Cities
Beaumont
China
Combes
Daisetta
La Feria
La Villa
Laguna Vista
Liberty
Mercedes
Mission
Nome
Old River-Winfree
Orange
Palmview
Pasadena
Pine Forest
Pinehurst
Plum Grove
Port Arthur
Port Isabel
Primera
Rio Hondo
Santa Rosa
Splendora
Vidor
West Orange
Woodloch
“Here to Help”
“Consecutive disasters have devastated communities in the Lower Rio Grande Valley and Southeast Texas, but the Texas General Land Office is here to help,” said Commissioner Buckingham. “These critical infrastructure awards will divert floodwaters away from homes, increase the resiliency of communities to respond to natural disasters, and restore peace of mind when the next storm hits.”
Out of the $227.5 million, GLO allocated $61,430,000 in disaster recovery funds for infrastructure projects. They will assist disaster relief, long-term recovery, and restoration of infrastructure for local communities. The rest of $227 million was allocated to grants that help individuals recover.
GLO announced the opening of the application for eligible counties and cities on March 15, 2022. Applications closed on August 1, 2022. Each applicant was eligible to submit a total of two applications. All activities had to contribute to the long-term recovery and restoration of infrastructure.
The GLO recognizes that repair and enhancements of local infrastructure are crucial components of long-term recovery and viability of communities.
Tropical Storm Imelda released an unprecedented 3-day total rainfall amount of 28 inches on Plum Grove. That limited the city’s ability to provide an immediate response due to the inundation of flood water. As a result, this project will provide much-needed drainage improvements within Orange Branch Creek which is located in the middle of the city and runs from the northeast down to the southeast. The project will install culverts and restore roads.
Splendora Lift Station Drainage Improvements – $596,625
Imelda flooding submerged the Pinewood Lift Station site, as well as its emergency generator and electrical switchgear located at the northern intersection of Pinewood Drive and First Street. Loss of both primary and emergency back-up power led to a sanitary sewer overflow at Pinewood lift station. Vehicular access, including emergency vehicle access, was not possible because of the depth of flooding in the area. This project includes drainage and generator improvements at the Pinewood Lift Station.
Construction will include the following activities:
Regrade ditch and install double headwalls
Install reinforced concrete pipe culverts under First Street with road restoration and ditch regrading
Install new natural gas generator and automatic transfer switch
Install an elevated metal platform, staircase and skid for generator
Liberty Water, Sewer Improvements – $1,000,000
The project will provide for water and sewer line improvements located within the eastern side of the city along Beaumont Road, Minglewood Road, Glenn Street and Tanner Street. These should reduce overflow concerns for residents and businesses along these streets. The project will make improvements to sewer lines and water lines and remove and replace existing lift stations with gravity sanitary sewer lines.
Descriptions of Other Grants
For a full description of other grants in this batch, see the GLO website.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/22/2023 based on information from the Texas General Land Office
2031 Days since Hurricane Harveyand 1280 Days since Imelda
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Screen-Shot-2020-08-03-at-5.55.45-PM.png?fit=846%2C780&ssl=1780846adminadmin2023-03-22 12:42:192023-03-22 12:50:55Plum Grove, Splendora, Liberty, Others Receive HUD Grants Through GLO
Tropical Cyclones Costliest Type of Weather-Related Disaster By Far
Since 1980, tropical cyclones have been the costliest type of weather-related disaster in the United States, according to NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI). The NCEI study includes events that caused at least one billion dollars in damages when adjusted for inflation.
Accounting for just under a fifth (17.6%) of the total number of events, tropical cyclones have caused more than half (53.8%) of the total damages.
Tropical cyclones also cause more deaths than any other type of weather-related disaster.
Types of Events Compared
NCEI monitors the following types of disasters:
Damages Quantified
Since 1980, the U.S. has sustained at least 341 billion-dollar, weather disasters (including Consumer Price Index adjustment to 2022). The total cost of these 341 events exceeds $2.4 trillion.
Out of that total, tropical cyclones have caused a combined $1.3 trillion in total damages—with an average of $22.2 billion per event. They leave droughts in the dust. Droughts are the second costliest.
Rank ordered based on average cost per event, they line up like this:
The table below contains additional information about the frequency of billion dollar events, their total costs, and the number of deaths they cause.
No Region Immune
All parts of the county experience weather-related disasters. The dominant types of disasters vary by region. For instance winter storms are more costly in the north, droughts in the plains, and tropical cyclones along seaboards.
Cost of Disasters Increasing
Both the number and cost of billion-dollar weather-related disasters are increasing over time. Here’s the breakdown by year.
Reasons Cited for Increases
Exercise caution when interpreting the upward slope of the graph above. It would be easy to attribute the slope solely to climate change and many people will,
But NCEI points out that increases in population, and material wealth over the last several decades are an important factor for higher damages. So are the locations of population concentrations and failure to adopt better building codes.
“These trends are further complicated by the fact that many population centers and infrastructure exist in vulnerable areas like coasts and river floodplains, while building codes are often insufficient in reducing damage from extreme events,” says NCEI.
Data Sources
In calculating the cost assessments, we receive input from a variety of public and private data sources including:
Costs Include…
Each of these data sources provides key pieces of information that capture the total, direct costs—both insured and uninsured—of weather and climate events. These costs include:
One of the key transformations is scaling up insured loss data to account for uninsured and underinsured losses, which differs by peril, geography, and asset class.
Costs Do Not Include…
However, these loss assessments do not take into account losses to natural capital or assets, health-care-related losses, or values associated with loss of life. Therefore, consider NCEI estimates conservative with respect to what is truly lost, but cannot be completely measured.
Posted by Bob Rehak based on Information from NCEI
2034 Days since Hurricane Harvey
Why Rivers Move
Have you ever flown over a winding river and wondered why rivers move? Why do they wander across the landscape and evolve the way they do? The lower Mississippi River and its delta form a spectacular example. But others are all around us.
Take, for instance, the Trinity River where it enters Galveston Bay. Or look on any map. You will likely see landscapes carved by rivers that leave evidence of their former paths behind.
But why do rivers change course? The brilliantly simple YouTube Video by Practical Engineering below describes the basics of “fluvial geomorphology.” That fancy phrase describes the science behind the shape of rivers.
The Mathematics of Geological Change
Back in 1944, a geologist named Harold Fisk, Ph.D., then a professor at Louisiana State, produced a report for the Army Corps of Engineers called “Geological Investigation of the Alluvial Valley of the Lower Mississippi River.”
Fisk produced gorgeous historical maps of the river snaking across miles of river valley.
A decade later, Emory Lane, a civil engineer and hydrologist at Colorado State University, went on to develop a unified theory of sediment transport. His theory explains the movement and shape of such rivers in an “equation” that uses just four variables:
Lane’s “equation” looks like this.
That funny symbol in the middle means ‘is proportional to.’ Scientists use it to show something that varies in relation to something else.
If you change one variable, one or more other variables change to bring the river back to its “normal” state. Scientists and engineers still use this formula today.
It means that in a stable stream, the flow of water multiplied by the slope is proportional to the amount of sediment being transported times the size of that sediment. (But don’t let that scare you!)
From Stream-Table Models to Real World
In the abstract, that may be a lot for average people to wrap their heads around. So the video uses a “stream table” and balance-scale model to illustrate what happens when you change each variable. They bring the formula to life and make it easy to understand. For example…
This can threaten roads, pipelines, and property. The eventual deposition of all that sediment can also choke a channel and contribute to flooding. Or fill up reservoirs and reduce water supply.
Sound familiar? All those things happened in the Lake Houston area.
To restore balance, the river changes its slope by increasing its length. This explains the meanders found in most rivers in this region. A meandering river wanders back and forth across the landscape like a snake instead of making a straight line through it.
Wherever slight bends occur, the river scours the outside of the curve (called the cut bank). That’s because the water moves faster on the outside of a curve. The river then deposits larger particles of sediment on inside curves farther downriver (called point bars) where water moves slower.
Eventually these curves in a river become so exaggerated, that they cut themselves off, leaving oxbow lakes behind.
This National Park Service page contains an excellent series of illustrations that show the evolution of meanders over time plus their migration across the landscape.
Lane’s equation predicts that there’s no such thing as a stable river. All rivers change all the time in response floods, drought, development, dams, sand mining, farming and more.
When Natural Systems Lose Balance…
At every point along a river or stream, erosion and deposition are constantly balancing each other.
But Lane’s equation can’t predict exactly where or when a river will move. Nor can it predict the rate of change. The Practical Engineering video points out that the rate and volume of change depend on other factors not in the equation, such as vegetation and the “pulsing” of flows as you might see downstream of a dam like the one on Lake Conroe.
The screen capture below shows what happened in models comparing a steady flow and a pulsed flow.
The pulsed flow creates much more erosion and faster movement of channels. And that has many real world implications.
Who Should Watch This Video?
This 16-minute video is a real eye opener for a variety of audiences. It’s suitable for students from late middle school and up. You don’t need to be a math or science whiz to understand it. Its power is its simplicity.
Among students, the video may stimulate curiosity in earth sciences, engineering, math, economics, history and urban planning. And for adults, it shows how four variables tie them all together.
It makes a great tutorial for policy makers struggling with issues such as setbacks from rivers for homes and businesses.
In addition, everyone who lives near or is considering buying property near a river, stream or channel should view this.
The producers say the next video in the Why-Rivers-Move series will show how human changes affect the flow of rivers. Can’t wait!
My thanks to Dr. Matthew Berg, CEO of Simfero Consultants for bringing this to my attention.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/24/23
2033 Days since Hurricane Harvey
Plum Grove, Splendora, Liberty, Others Receive HUD Grants Through GLO
GLO Commissioner Dawn Buckingham, M.D., announced yesterday more than $43 million in HUD grants for 44 infrastructure projects stemming from 2019 Disasters. The $43 million is the combined total of grants made to counties and cities stretching from the Rio Grande Valley to southeast Texas.
The infrastructure-project grants will help communities recover from the 2019 South Texas Floods as well as Tropical Storm Imelda, which devastated SE Texas.
List of Recipients
The funds will be used to improve streets as well as water and drainage facilities in:
“Here to Help”
“Consecutive disasters have devastated communities in the Lower Rio Grande Valley and Southeast Texas, but the Texas General Land Office is here to help,” said Commissioner Buckingham. “These critical infrastructure awards will divert floodwaters away from homes, increase the resiliency of communities to respond to natural disasters, and restore peace of mind when the next storm hits.”
Texas GLO 2019 Disaster-Recovery Funds
The Texas General Land Office (GLO) is administering $227,510,000 in Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) related to 2019 flooding. This is separate from the $750 million in mitigation funding related to Harvey and Harris County.
Out of the $227.5 million, GLO allocated $61,430,000 in disaster recovery funds for infrastructure projects. They will assist disaster relief, long-term recovery, and restoration of infrastructure for local communities. The rest of $227 million was allocated to grants that help individuals recover.
GLO announced the opening of the application for eligible counties and cities on March 15, 2022. Applications closed on August 1, 2022. Each applicant was eligible to submit a total of two applications. All activities had to contribute to the long-term recovery and restoration of infrastructure.
The GLO recognizes that repair and enhancements of local infrastructure are crucial components of long-term recovery and viability of communities.
To learn more, visit https://recovery.texas.gov/2018-floods-2019-disasters/programs/2019-disasters-infrastructure-competition/index.html.
Plum Grove Drainage Improvements – $1,000,000
Tropical Storm Imelda released an unprecedented 3-day total rainfall amount of 28 inches on Plum Grove. That limited the city’s ability to provide an immediate response due to the inundation of flood water. As a result, this project will provide much-needed drainage improvements within Orange Branch Creek which is located in the middle of the city and runs from the northeast down to the southeast. The project will install culverts and restore roads.
Splendora Lift Station Drainage Improvements – $596,625
Imelda flooding submerged the Pinewood Lift Station site, as well as its emergency generator and electrical switchgear located at the northern intersection of Pinewood Drive and First Street. Loss of both primary and emergency back-up power led to a sanitary sewer overflow at Pinewood lift station. Vehicular access, including emergency vehicle access, was not possible because of the depth of flooding in the area. This project includes drainage and generator improvements at the Pinewood Lift Station.
Construction will include the following activities:
Liberty Water, Sewer Improvements – $1,000,000
The project will provide for water and sewer line improvements located within the eastern side of the city along Beaumont Road, Minglewood Road, Glenn Street and Tanner Street. These should reduce overflow concerns for residents and businesses along these streets. The project will make improvements to sewer lines and water lines and remove and replace existing lift stations with gravity sanitary sewer lines.
Descriptions of Other Grants
For a full description of other grants in this batch, see the GLO website.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/22/2023 based on information from the Texas General Land Office
2031 Days since Hurricane Harvey and 1280 Days since Imelda