Latest news with #AlanGerard
Yahoo
14-07-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Retired NWS forecaster shares thoughts on Texas tragedy
ST. LOUIS – The flash floods that struck Texas on the Fourth of July weekend have prompted tough questions about weather alerts and public safety. Alan Gerard, a retired National Weather Service meteorologist and owner of joined FOX 2 meteorologist Chris Higgins on Weather Extra and discussed how weather officials issued both watches and warnings well in advance of the deadly flooding. 'For the most part, the watches and warnings are about what people should be expecting from the weather service for this kind of an event,' Gerard said. The National Weather Service posted a flash flood watch nearly 12 hours before rainfall began and issued a warning just after 1 a.m. on July 4, using strong language that activated wireless emergency alerts. Close Thanks for signing up! Watch for us in your inbox. Subscribe Now Despite the timely alerts, not everyone received or acted on them, raising important questions about how the public interprets and responds to warnings. 'There's all these kinds of issues that aren't about the meteorology but are about how the rubber hits the road,' Gerard said. Gerard highlighted the growing need for social science research to better understand human behavior during emergencies. He also expressed concern about proposed federal budget cuts that could significantly impact NOAA's research capabilities, including vital work done at the National Weather Center in Oklahoma. 'I would hate to see us going in the opposite direction,' he said. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
12-07-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Texas' 'flash flood alley': For centuries, a 'bull's-eye' when epic rain falls
The catastrophic flooding in the Hill Country of south-central Texas on July 4 took place in a region that's known as "flash flood alley," a geographic area that also includes many of the state's major metropolitan areas, such as San Antonio, Dallas, Austin and Waco. This region is among the nation's most prone to flash flooding, known for its propensity for fast and furious flooding when extreme rain falls, Alan Gerard, CEO of weather consulting company Balanced Weather said. As bountiful moist air from the Gulf of America, renamed from the Gulf of Mexico, moves over the steep hills, it can dump heavy rain. Experts say the flooding was not a surprise, based on historical and prehistorical data: "The flooding was certainly extreme but it should not have been historically unexpected," said political scientist Roger Pielke, Jr., in an email. "The documented record of extreme flooding in 'flash flood alley' goes back several centuries, with paleoclimatology records extending that record thousands of years into the past," he said. Extreme flooding began in the Texas Hill Country around 4 a.m., on July 4 as thunderstorms dropped more than 10 inches of rain on the region. The rain overwhelmed the Guadalupe River, causing it to quickly rise. Scores of people have died in the devastating floods, including 27 campers and counselors from Camp Mystic, an all-girls camp in Central Texas. Geology is a key factor in the designation of flash flood alley. The "Balcones Escarpment," a geologic fault line that roughly parallels Interstate 35, marks the location of flash flood alley. This inactive fault zone formed a rise in the topography in the area, which enhances storm systems that pass over it, causing them to dump more rain there than they might elsewhere, according to AccuWeather. "We're going from the coastal plains right into the Hill Country. There's a rise of at least about 500 feet in elevation," Pete Rose, a meteorologist with the Lower Colorado River Authority, told AccuWeather in 2022. "Along with that, you have a lot of your hills and valleys that go along with that type of topography, and these hills don't contain a lot of soil; they have very thin soil. So when rain does hit them, not much of it gets absorbed," Rose said, noting that water will rush down the valleys and pile into creeks and streams. Warm, moist air from the Gulf helps fuel storms as well, giving them ample moisture to dump lots of rain in a short amount of time across the dusty Texas soil. Remembering the flood victims: Twin sisters; woman who 'shaped generations of campers' among victims Pielke points to a classic 1940 historical text on U.S. floods, which shows that "the same region of Texas that experienced this week's floods has long been known to be a bull's-eye for flash flooding." In fact, almost a century before that book was published, Texas experienced one of the greatest losses of life in U.S. history related to extreme weather. In 1846, in the months after Texas became a U.S. state, massive flooding compounded the many problems facing thousands of recent immigrants from Germany who had been settled in New Braunfels, Texas, which was significantly impacted by this week's floods, Pielke said. According to a 1846 account, cited in a 2006 PhD dissertation on flooding in Texas by William Keith Guthrie, at the University of Kansas: "The Guadalupe (River) would often rise 15 feet above its normal stand after these heavy rains, carrying with it in its swift torrent a number of large trees, uprooted farther up the hills. Smaller brooks, ordinarily not containing flowing water, became raging torrents which could be crossed only by swimming." According to Guthrie's dissertation, "archaeological evidence indicates that Paleo-Indians adapted to the region's flood regimes by careful placement of campsites and nomadic lifestyles. Native Americans during the earliest periods of contact with Europeans in Texas, according to Spanish records, also adapted to the prevailing cycles of seasonal flooding in the state's interior by modifying their economic trade cycles." What Texas cities flooded? Here's where the most rain fell this weekend Flood experts believe that the future will bring an increased risk of flash flooding to this already flood-prone area as more development in the region creates more impermeable surfaces and thus more runoff, AccuWeather said. Bigger storms, enhanced by a changing climate, may also lead to more flash flooding as a warmer atmosphere allows storms to hold more water. "Cities such as Austin have been taking preventative measures to warn locals about the threat of flash flooding, putting up signs in areas that flood frequently. Austin also has the Flood Early Warning System, a network of rain gauges, barricades and cameras that monitor the threat of flooding in the city," according to AccuWeather. "This tragedy occurred in a location that has among the greatest risks in the nation of flash flooding, where kids in summer camps have previously been swept away to their deaths, and where warning systems are (apparently and incredibly) not in place," Pielke said. "This tragedy never should have happened and it should never happen again." Flooding in Texas could be among the worst on Earth, Rose said, noting that "we're in a very, very flash flood-prone area, not only of Texas but out of the country and even the world." Contributing: Dinah Voyles Pulver, USA TODAY This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Why Texas' 'flash flood alley' is a 'bull's-eye' when epic rain falls
Yahoo
10-07-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Could Texas flash floods happen on St. Johns River in Florida? What the experts say
After flash floods in Texas killed at least 119 people and left dozens unaccounted for when the Guadalupe River surged following torrential rain on Fourth of July, it's worth wondering if the same catastrophic flooding could occur along the St. Johns River in Florida. Here's a look at what happened in Texas and what factors, if any, might impact a similar scenario along the 310 miles of the St. Johns River in Florida. Texas Hill Country is no stranger to extreme flooding. The Guadalupe has flooded more than a dozen times since 1978, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, but the Independence Day flood is among the worst in its history. Several factors came together at once — in one of the worst possible locations — to create the 'horrifying' scenario that dropped up to 16 inches of rainfall in the larger region over July 3-5, Alan Gerard, a recently retired storm specialist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration told USA Today. Hill Country, the region in Central and South Central Texas, also is known as 'Flash Flood Alley,' for its propensity for fast and furious flooding when extreme rain falls. As bountiful moist air from the Gulf of America, renamed from the Gulf of Mexico, moves over the steep hills, it can dump heavy rains. The Balcones Escarpment, a geological feature which roughly parallels Interstate 35 in Texas, marks the edge of Flash Flood Alley, according to AccuWeather. The inactive fault zone formed a rise in the topography in the area, which enhances storm systems that pass over it, causing them to dump more rain there than they might elsewhere. The likelihood of flooding is exacerbated by the transition from elevated hill country to coastal plains, according to experts with the Lower Colorado River Authority. Additionally, the landscape is characterized by very thin soil that doesn't absorb much rain. Those factors combined with warm, moist air from the Gulf fuel storms, enabling them to dump lots of rain in a short amount of time on the dusty soil. Although Florida has no shortage of the moist tropical air that contributed to the rainfall that caused the catastrophic Texas floods, there's virtually no chance of flash floods along the St. Johns River, said Jessie Schaper, meteorologist and hydrology program manager at the National Weather Service in Melbourne. 'Absolutely not,' Schaper said of the potential likelihood of flash floods in Florida. 'We do not have the terrain here that they do in Texas Hill Country, so that type of thing we'd never see on the St. Johns,' she said. 'It is a very slow-moving river. It drains a large area, but it's essentially flat.' The St. Johns River has a very low elevation drop, less than 30 feet over its 310-mile length. That translates to an average drop of about 1-inch per mile, making it one of 'laziest" rivers in the world, according to the St. Johns River Water Management District. 'Think about water in a tray. That's really all that there is. It flows very slowly, and it takes a long time to drain the water out to the Atlantic. We don't see rainfall rushing down the side of a hill or mountain into the St. Johns River.' Another key difference between Texas and Florida is the soil, Schaper said. 'We could see a heavy rainfall event, but the topography of Florida is totally different than that area of Texas,' she said. 'We have very sandy soil and it absorbs water very quickly. Three inches of rain here looks very different than 3 inches out west, where there's really rocky soil.' At the same time, flooding has been a part of recent tropical storms and hurricanes from Ian and Nicole in 2022 to Milton this past fall, as anyone in Daytona Beach's historic Midtown neighborhood or along the St. Johns River near DeLand can attest. The highest historic crest of the St. Johns River near DeLand was 6.33 feet recorded on Oct. 11, 2022, during Tropical Storm Ian, according to the National Weather Service. Such inundations are different from the flash floods that ravaged Texas, Schaper said. 'We get concerned about it during hurricane season, of course, but it's not about a flash flood,' she said. 'It's more of a long-term flood that might last for weeks or months at a time, not so much the drastic rise of water that it was in Texas. 'During Milton we saw 15 inches of rain, and during Ian some locations had 20 inches,' she said, noting that those totals were in the range of the 16 inches that fell on the larger Texas Hill Country region over the holiday weekend. Although flash floods aren't a specific concern, Florida has become prone to hurricane-generated storm surges that have increasingly become dangerous flooding events with inundation. Whether from coastal storm surges or inland rising water, such events can pose just as much or more of a risk than hurricane winds. Reporter Dinah Pulver of USA Today contributed to this report. This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Could Texas-style flash floods happen on Florida's St. Johns River?
Yahoo
08-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
NOAA budget spells out plans to reduce spending and abandon climate research
A new budget document from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration spells out in detail what many scientists and researchers both in and out of the federal government have feared since a White House budget proposal in the spring. If approved by Congress, it would reduce NOAA's expenses by 30%, roughly $2 billion, and the 12,000-member staff by 18%. It would eliminate the agency's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research and zero out funding for its climate, weather and ocean laboratories and cooperative institutes, which work to improve forecasting and better understand weather patterns and the ocean. That includes an office that helps support the pioneering carbon dioxide monitoring on Hawaii's Mauna Loa, and another that supports the National Sea Grant program and its aquaculture research. Sea Grant is a 50-year-old federal university partnership that assists coastal communities and local economies with understanding, conserving and using coastal resources. It's clear the administration intends to have NOAA "completely abandon climate science," Alan Gerard, who retired earlier this year from the National Severe Storms Laboratory, one of the labs proposed for elimination, wrote in a June 30 Substack post. NOAA's focus on the warming climate, and the increase in extreme weather events such as heavy rainfall and longer droughts, has been criticized by the Trump administration and its supporters. Warming signs started in the 1800s Here's what humanity knew about climate change and when. Reaction to the release of the detailed budget swept social media on June 30 and "brought back into the spotlight what the administration wants to do to NOAA research," said James Franklin, retired branch chief of the hurricane forecast specialists at the National Hurricane Center. Members of the American Meteorological Society and others are worried the actions taken at NOAA are risking the nation's safety and economy. Franklin and other NOAA supporters are waiting to see what Congress does with the proposals from President Donald Trump and the agency. Gerard wrote that it is "jarring to read such hugely damaging cuts to our science and public safety programs spelled out in such antiseptic, matter-of-fact language." He doesn't have high hopes for Congress's ability to reverse the proposed cuts. The administration's budget indicates "that they believe that they can use budget rescission and impoundment to help achieve their goals regardless of Congressional budget action," he wrote. The budget states NOAA will continue to support 'high priority ocean and weather research programs' within the National Weather Service and the National Ocean Service. At the weather service, NOAA said it plans to streamline field operations and "deepen" partnerships with the commercial weather enterprise while continuing to produce operational forecasts and warnings to the emergency management community and public as they "prepare for and respond to increasingly frequent severe weather and water events." Sticking closely to a mission stated by the White House early on, the budget reductions focus heavily on climate-related research, regardless of whether it's research on the overall climate or climate change. The White House directives have mirrored recommendations of the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025, which lambasted NOAA for being "one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry," and suggested privatization of some NOAA functions. The proposed budget states it would no longer support the National Integrated Heat Health Information System, a federal website on heat and heat-related illnesses that brings together information from NOAA and more than a dozen other departments and agencies. If approved by Congress, the budget would close such laboratories as the 52-year-old Atlantic Oceanographic & Meteorological Laboratory in Miami, a key partner of the National Hurricane Center. It would also close the Global Monitoring Laboratory, with offices in Mauna Loa, Hawaii, Colorado; Alaska; American Samoa and the South Pole, and eliminate funding for a nationwide network of soil moisture sensors. Mauna Loa is home to the Mauna Loa Observatory, the world's longest-running station that monitors carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It's not clear what the withdrawal of NOAA staff and offices would mean for the observatory, where monitoring takes place in collaboration with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. "The observatory needs staff and the staff are based in Hilo," Ralph Keeling, who directs the institution's CO2 Program, told USA TODAY earlier in the year after the Department of Governmental Efficiency announced plans to shutter a NOAA office in Hilo. The budget also proposes closing the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory, with two offices in Michigan, as well as the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle. The closure of the labs could halt all forward progress on improving hurricane forecasts, Franklin said. "The kinds of tools that tend to come out of the NOAA labs are things that allow the forecasters to analyze the storms better." Aspects of the hurricane center's operations developed within the agency's laboratories and cooperative institutes include the Hurricane Analysis and Forecasting System, NOAA's 'state-of-the-art, high-resolution coupled modeling system,' as well as leading statistical models for forecasting intensity and rapid intensification of hurricanes, Franklin said. Others provided techniques to estimate a storm's intensity using satellite imagery and tools dropped from hurricane hunter planes to document the vertical structure of hurricane eye walls. Only a small fraction of NOAA Research would remain and be transferred to the National Weather Service, including portions of the weather, tornado and technology research. The budget does not state whether the weather service intends to keep all of its 122 weather forecast offices open, but it does say it would continue to translate key products into Spanish, Samoan, Chinese, Vietnamese, and French. (This story has been updated to correct a typo.) Dinah Voyles Pulver, a national correspondent for USA TODAY, covers climate change, weather, the environment and other news. Reach her at dpulver@ or @dinahvp on Bluesky or X or dinahvp.77 on Signal. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: NOAA proposes shaving 30% of its budget
USA Today
07-07-2025
- Climate
- USA Today
Who's to blame for Texas flooding tragedy? There is a lot of finger pointing.
The catastrophe was caused by a perfect storm of difficult-to-forecast rainfall and fast-moving water. Some wonder if budget cuts made things worse. The Texas rains hadn't even slowed before the debate began about why forecasts had underestimated the devastating flooding over Independence Day weekend. Local and state officials, social media users and even the meteorology community raised questions. What were the National Weather Service forecasts? Why is it so hard to know where rain will fall? Did staff reductions at the weather service, and other budget cuts by the Trump administration contribute to the catastrophe? What role did weather balloons play in the storm forecasts? Answers to some of these questions and many others may never be adequately answered, especially for the families of dozens of children swept away by floodwaters. At least 81 people died between July 4 and 6 and dozens more were injured or remain missing, state officials said. On a weekend when families often celebrate with cookouts and fireworks, these families, overwhelmed with grief, were providing DNA samples so a state laboratory could rapidly identify victims. Impact of cuts: NOAA budget spells out plans to reduce spending and abandon climate research A series of circumstances, colliding at the worst possible location and time, caused the tremendous flooding, several meteorologists told USA TODAY. During a July 6 news conference, Texas state officials said there would be much to discuss in the weeks ahead. A few things are known, including how difficult it remains to pinpoint where thunderstorms will drop their heaviest rain, what the weather service said and when, and staffing levels at two local forecast offices. The horrific tragedy arrived in the midst of a maelstrom already brewing over the National Weather Service, its parent agency and the Trump administration's budget cuts. It's 'clear that many people are allowing their desire to score political points to color their insights and opinions on this tragedy," Alan Gerard, who retired earlier this year from the National Severe Storms Laboratory, wrote in his Substack blog on July 6. 'The National Weather Service office did everything they should do from everything I can tell,' said Jeff Masters, co-founder of Weather Underground, a commercial forecasting agency, and a former hurricane scientist with the NOAA Hurricane Hunters. Despite the recent cuts to NOAA, the National Weather Service performed well in the Texas tragedy and in the recent deadly flooding in Kentucky, Masters said. 'It reminds us how important it is to have talented, experienced people at a well-funded National Weather Service.' 'But we are pushing our luck," he noted," if we think the cuts at NOAA won't cause a breakdown in our ability to get people out of harm's way in the future.' Were weather forecasts wrong? Although the warnings arrived less than 24 hours before the flooding started, long-time weather service veterans and regional experts say that's not all that unusual in this region. It's a known shortcoming of the localized rain models forecasters use. They can't yet pinpoint exactly where intense rain might fall and when on an individual community. One expert, Texas State Climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon, said it appears the weather service employees in Austin/San Antonio did what they could, based on the available information. "From what I saw, the warnings were pretty timely," said Nielsen-Gammon, a meteorology professor at Texas A&M University, The weather service office first advised on July 1 and 2 that a very moist air mass was moving in that would increase rain chances across south-central Texas with heavy rain at times that could lead to minor local early morning forecast on July 3 by the NWS Weather Prediction Center said the region should expect 'unseasonably moist' air that could bring 1 to 2 inches of rain an hour and lead to flooding, with approaching storms tapping into abundant tropical moisture. As the day progressed, a clearer picture emerged of how weather systems were interacting above Texas to form storms. An 'urgent' flood watch at 1:18 p.m. July 3 warned heavy rain, with isolated amounts of 5 to 7 inches, could cause flash flooding and 'excessive' runoff that could flood rivers and streams. The watch covered eight counties, including Kerr and Bandera where some of the heaviest flooding occurred. By 7:02 p.m., the weather prediction center warned leftover bits of Tropical Storm Barry, near-record moisture and an unstable atmosphere meant any storms that formed could be self-sustaining, with a potential for rain rates of more than 3 inches an hour, and they could rain over the same area again and again. It stated: 'Considerable flash flooding this evening is possible." A flurry of forecast updates continued. At 1:14 a.m. on July 4, the weather service issued a "Flash Flood Warning" for central Kerr County and northwestern Bandera County. Almost simultaneously, water flow began increasing dramatically on the Guadalupe River at Hunt, Texas. "This pleasing stream had a flow rate of 53 gallons per second at midnight on July 4," said Nielsen-Gammon. At 3 a.m., it was flowing at 264 gallons per second. Between 3 a.m. and 3:30 am., the water flow jumped to 125,000 gallons per second. Within four hours of the initial rise, the river level jumped 21.8 feet and was flowing at 900,000 gallons per second. Did weather service cuts have an impact? President Donald Trump campaigned on cutting the federal bureaucracy and reducing the budget. His administration, including the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Governmental Efficiency, has been mission-focused on doing so. The sweeping cuts left many federal offices short-staffed and demoralized, according to recent retirees. Many remaining employees, including those who declined to speak on the record for fear of retribution, say employees still fear more jobs will be lost in a reduction in force. Federal agencies were required to prepare a plan for making further reductions, but a federal judge in California ruled in May that the job cuts could not move forward. The weather service office in Austin/San Antonio oversees much of the Hill Country area where the flooding took place. Of the 26 staff positions in that office, six are vacant at the moment, including two senior members, said Victor Murphy, a recently retired National Weather Service meteorologist in Texas. One of those is the warning coordination meteorologist who oversees emergency warnings and working with local officials on communicating around such events. The Austin office also is short two forecasters. Did the cuts play any role in the recent tragedy? Murphy wondered out loud. "I don't know … The fact is that the office had record flooding two days in a row.' The San Angelo, Texas office is down four positions, including a staff forecaster, a lead hydrologist and its meteorologist in charge, said Tom Fahy, legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization. Weather service forecasters often become "an easy target for people's wrath," when people are looking for someone to blame, Fahy said. 'The real blame is the Trump Administration budget cuts to NWS and FEMA that cut off coordination planning with local emergency management officials,' he said. 'Even during Trump's 1st term, NWS managers would plan, practice and train their combined teams for increased cooperation. All that ended when Trump was inaugurated in 2025.' President Trump said July 6 that he doesn't think the federal government needs to rehire weather service meteorologists in the wake of catastrophic Texas flooding. 'I would think not,' Trump told reporters when asked about rehiring weather forecasters, adding that flooding 'happened in seconds. Nobody expected it.' When asked if he would investigate whether the cuts left key vacancies in the weather service or emergency coordination, Trump said he "wouldn't blame (former President Joe) Biden for it either. I would just say this is a 100-year catastrophe, and it's just so horrible for all." Why is it so hard to know where rain will fall? At a news conference on July 5, Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management, said: "The original forecast that we received on Wednesday from the National Weather Service predicted 3 to 6 inches of rain in the Concho valley and 4 to 8 inches in the Hill Country." "The amount of rain that fell in this specific location was never in any of those forecasts," Kidd said. Rainfall estimates in these extreme rainfall events have fallen short before, frustrating emergency managers, forecasters and even members of Congress, who approved measures in 2021 and 2022 to improve rainfall modeling and estimates of maximum possible precipitation within any given time frame. As the weather service looked at their computers on July 3, the models they use for forecasting thunderstorms wouldn't come together with a consensus on where the greatest rain would fall, according to their discussions. Many showed the potential for extreme rainfall somewhere in central Texas, while others showed almost nothing happening, Nielsen-Gammon said. "Where it was going to develop would depend on the details of the individual thunderstorms that popped up." Pinpointing localized extreme rain remains "a very difficult challenge," said Gerard. Any time you have this type of environment, there's going to be a chance that local areas are going to get more rain than anticipated." Rainfall in a storm is 'controlled by very small-scale processes that are happening within the storm,' said Gerard, now CEO of weather consulting company Balanced Weather. 'We don't have the resolution of modeling to be able to forecast that yet.' The storms laboratory is working to develop higher resolution modeling, he said, but it's on the chopping block in the president's proposed budget. Did weather service balloon launches play a role? Weather balloon launches measure moisture up through the atmosphere to help predict how much is available for rain. The better the data, the better the outcome, said Murphy, the recently retired Texas meteorologist. "You find out from a sounding what's up 20,000, 30,000 or 40,000 feet. The only way to measure that is with a balloon.' However, staffing shortages at local weather service offices across the U.S. has forced the limiting or cancelation of numerous weather balloon launches. Of 11 locations in Texas and surrounding states that were launching in the early spring, only six of the sites now launch balloons on any given morning, Murphy said. There was only one weather balloon launch within 200 miles of the flooded area, Nielsen-Gammon said. However, that one weather balloon proved its worth, the experts said, providing essential information that helped weather service forecasters see the increased chances for rain. Launched remotely from an automated site in Del Rio, Texas, Murphy said it's "the only one of its kind in the region.' But the federal cutbacks and rising number of climate disasters mean the public is likely to blame someone for every botched forecast and missed opportunity to warn ‒ whether deservedly or not. On July 7, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended the president and the National Weather Service's performance. 'Blaming President Trump for these floods is a depraved lie and it serves no purpose during this time of national mourning," Leavitt said. "The National Weather Service did its job." Contributing: Zac Anderson and Joey Garrison, USA TODAY Dinah Voyles Pulver, a national correspondent for USA TODAY, writes about climate change, violent weather and other news. Reach her at dpulver@ or @dinahvp on Bluesky or X or dinahvp.77 on Signal.
