Twelve of Fourteen

A week or two after we completed our last camping excursion, I began looking at the long-range forecast to plan our next outing.  Given other events, and garden tending, we knew we needed to wait to after the 20th of that month, or perhaps even the following week.  For over three weeks I have looked at the forecast for McFarland, and areas of northern Wisconsin.  What I had noticed every time I checked prior to today, was that rain or thunderstorms were predicted for twelve of the next fourteen days.  

Source:  Channel3000.com Chris Reece article

Looking at the Madison, WI area, streets in the isthmus of Madison have been closed, schools in some counties northwest of Madison (Reedsburg, as an example) have yet to open, all due to flooding. (Reedsburg has now been closed for two days, and we have not even had any snow. While the Madison area had a great deal of rain in June, July and the first part of August were relatively dry, with July being dryer than normal, although not near dry enough to not need to mow the lawn.  On August 17, a large storm dumped about 6" of rain from Waunakee to Watertown, and some lesser amounts elsewhere, I think my rain gauge had about 3.2" for that rain event. To show that Mother Nature holds no favorites, the northwest side of Madison, particularly the city of Middleton and west to Cross Plains received almost 11" of rain in a ten hour period a few days later on August 20; what has been termed a 1,000 year storm.  During that event, most of Madison received 4".  The total for August for the Madison area, as recorded at the Dane County Airport, was 10.4" with a normal rainfall for August being 4.27".  As of 5:00 pm yesterday, September 4, 2018, the annual precipitation received is 38.14" compared to a normal of 25.28" for the year to date.  

Source:  Channel3000.com Chris Reece article
Notice the counter clockwise orange arrow rotation

Looking at the weather radar for the August 17 and August 20 storms one thing struck me:  they were a rotating system moving in a counter clockwise motion, very slowly moving easterly.  The rotation caused the storms to move slowly and to essentially dump a large amount of moisture in a certain, smaller, geographic area.  This rotation reminded me of the mid to late April snow storm which dumped over 30" of snow in parts of central Wisconsin, such as Waupaca to Green Bay.

Source:  Channel3000.com, Chris Reece article
An upper atmospheric river

Last week an article in the paper noted the large Madison event, and promised it would explain the reason for the heavy rainfalls next week.  That article noted the system rotation and said the lack of lightening was telling, but it never really explained why.  For an explanation, my spouse pointed out an article on Channel 3000 (on-line), which you can see here.  

Our Backyard, Wednesday Sept 5, 2018, about 12:45 pm.

The article, by Chris Reece, noted that the answer "lies in the upper atmospheric setup."  He goes on to note that during most of the summer a high pressure system over the southeast part of the United States has "kept a constant stream of tropical moisture flowing directly into the Upper Midwest.  This also caused the summer to be very humid.  The moisture remained undisturbed and  was sitting in the upper atmosphere over the state of Wisconsin.  As August took hold, the jet stream became more active and produced what Reece calls "several waves of low pressure that have tracked directly through the area over the past few weeks."  He noted that each of the systems took existing moisture and intensified the "pool of water vapor over the area, deepening the amount of moisture in our skies, and ultimately raining it out in the seemingly unending rounds of thunderstorms the area has received." So, if what he says is true some of this moisture, from the Gulf, dated back to June.

Rain gauge in our yard, Sept 5, 2018
Rain accumulation mainly since about 8:30 am to  about 12:45 pm

A news report today has flood damage in Dane County for the past few weeks being $154 million.  this is only $20 million more than what Aaron Rogers will make over four years (a four year extension to his current contract that has two years remaining).  Lake levels are at historic highs.  The streets in Madison, and other locales are flooded either by high streams or lakes, or surcharging of the storm water system.  A storm water pipe surcharges when the water at its outfall is equal to or higher than the inlet.   Another problem is that construction sites are now discharging more sediment laden water into the lakes, streams, and wetlands of the state.  For example, the school construction project behind me has been sending sediment laden storm water downstream since the project began last August.  Complaints to the Village, have been met with, well, they have let the contractor know.  (A lot of good this does.)  The Public Works Director seemed unconcerned since most of the water goes to storm ponds, or (get this) wetlands.  Oh my gosh!  I could not believe it.  First, the storm ponds need to be functioning at the school which they, as the following photo shows, are not. Second, wetlands are not to be depositories of sediment.  With that thinking why even have erosion control.

McFarland Primary School detention pond, overflow pipe
Sediment laden water entering the inlet to transfer to drainage ditches and then to wetlands and lake.
As part of the construction, they are reworking this pond.
Rain on the lens caused my lens cover to not sufficiently open.
Photo by author Sunday, Sept 2, 2018 about 5:15 pm.

Four days into September, Madison has already received 2.11" or 2/3 of the normal expected 3.13" for the whole month.  By the end of today this will likely be broken.  By 12:45 pm today my rain gauge recorded, albeit this is an unofficial amount, of just over 1.5".  More rain is yet expected through most of the day.  But for a brief sprinkle early in the morning, the rain started about 8:30 am.  These large storms reminds me of August of 2007 when large storms produced substantial flooding rainfall, but not as bad as this year.  What followed that winter was over 100" of snow in Madison, and the following June the large storms that broke the Lake Delton Dam and closed I-90/94 near the Dells and flooded many other streets.  

Drainage channel at the end of our block where the school storm water discharges to the open ditch.
Notice the color of the water from the sediment.
Author photo, Sunday, Sept. 2, 2018 about 5:20 pm

Will the Madison area lakes and streams be able to sufficiently handle this additional rainfall?  On Monday of this week, the Weather Channel app had rain predicted for the Madison area for a predictable 12 of the next 14 days. The past number of weeks, the forecast has been rather accurate. Today, that has changed.  One could expect the other two days to be of rain, but it is now actually predicting many fewer days of rain, in fact none in its long-range forecast after today.  The newspaper report is less optimistic, in its next four days (Thursday to Sunday), rain is expected Saturday.  The weekend rain, I thought, may be related to the Tropical Storm affecting the south; perhaps that will not take a route to bring the moisture to Wisconsin as earlier expected.   If the forecast is altered, we may get a camping trip in, but will it be dry?   Experience shows that even when a forecast is for 10% chance of rain, that rain chance will find us.