100 year storm!

[Scott Patterson]

Anyone else see the Utah flooding? I have never seen anything like it. This was a 100 year storm. Rivers (not creeks!) almost 1000 feet high were pouring off all the cliffs in Capitol Reef National Park. I was afraid to take out my camera, but had to for one shot.

The campground in Capitol Reef itself was a river. Cliffs were collapsing as well with landslides galore. Parts of Hanksville (supposedly the 2nd driest place in the state) were under 5 feet of water and a family had to be rescued by hovercraft. Every backcountry road was closed and Highway 24 was washed out in one place and buried by debri in others. That morning rivers were also flowing along the highway to Moab.

Another storm hit Monday when we were hiking out even though when we left they claimed 20% chance of rain. More flooding, but we got out of there as fast as we could. Dozens of waterfalls were spilling off the cliffs in Chimney Rock Canyon.

The storm in Hanksville produced 3.00 inches of rain on the 7th alone, plus quite a bit more on the other dates. This record was 8 times the old record for the date and almost double the all time record for any date on any day of the year. Records in Hanksville go back to 1898.

I've seen it rain this hard and long in the tropics, but never in the desert. Most storms in the desert are intense but breif thunderstorms. This one lasted continuously for over 24 hours and then went to repeat itself only two days later.

While three inches in a day might not seem like that much to someone from the hurricane belt, keep in mind this area is mostly barren rock with little soil or vegitation to absorb the water. Even .25 inches causes some big floods in the desert and everything just flows off rock.

[bob rulz]

Yeah, it was an amazing storm. There was actually an area in eastern Utah on the Tavaputs Plateau that saw 6 inches in 36 hours!

And by the way, I have a topic about this below.

[Scott Patterson]

And by the way, I have a topic about this below

Oops, sorry. I'll post the above on that one.