I thought it was weird to hear that people were recommended to shelter in place, but then, I’ve only learned how to respond to earthquakes and fires, not hurricanes, so I figured I didn’t understand something… This discussion is helping me see that the local authorities were likely at least irresponsible with their initial recommendations…
My heart goes out to the people in Houston.
@CWOTUS It was my understanding that scientists are comfortable linking Harvey with climate change because its intensity fits with patterns predicted by climate change. From what I understood, they have also tracked a steady increase in precipitation events in the area over the past several decades.
There isn’t an attribution study completed yet on Harvey, but there is one completed on “torrential rains” that hit neighbor Louisiana a year ago and caused severe flooding there. The analysis finds that:
A Central U.S. Gulf Coast extreme precipitation event has become more likely and more intense in 2016 than it was in 1900 as a result of climate change. Analyses based on observational precipitation data found clear positive trends in rainfall frequency and intensity. [. . .]
Based on these different approaches [explained in the text] – all of which are in agreement – the team found that human-caused climate change increased the frequency and intensity of the heavy rains such as the August 12 – 14 event along the Central U.S. Gulf Coast region. [. . .]
By comparing recent three-day precipitation extremes for the Central U.S. Gulf Coast region with the historical record and climate model simulations, the team found that an event like this is now expected to occur at least 40 percent more often than it was in our pre-industrial past. Precipitation intensity increased by roughly 10 percent as a result of human-caused climate change.