ORLANDO, Fla. – The Sunshine State is no stranger to heavy rain and flooding, but what happened in about 12 hours on April 12 is nothing short of historic and unprecedented.
If verified, the nearly 26″ of rain that fell in Fort Lauderdale would break the state record for most rain in a 24-hour period.
The previous record was nearly 24 inches set back in 1980 in Key West.
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The numbers are astonishing by themselves, but what makes the Fort Lauderdale event even more unprecedented was the fact this was not from a tropical system.
How It happened
A large non-tropical low meandering in the north Gulf Coast helped to pull tropical moisture from the southwest Atlantic and Caribbean into South Florida.
The first wave of heavy rain moved through southeast Florida early in the afternoon.
The second wave of heavy rain was from a lone supercell thunderstorm that developed in the early afternoon and remained nearly stationary for hours, dumping heavy rain over the same areas.
It wasn’t until around 11 p.m. that the storm finally dissipated.
While records are defined by a 24-hour period, most of the nearly 26″ of rain fell in well under 12 hours. This cell also produced two weak tornadoes in the same area.
Climate Change?
No one weather event can be blamed on climate change. Climate change, however, did have its fingerprints all over this event. Even without the warming Earth, the storm in the north Gulf Coast would have been there and the nearly-stationary storm would have developed.
The main calling card when it comes to climate change is increased moisture in the atmosphere. This storm was able to take advantage of the extra moisture content and was likely able to produce heavier rain than it otherwise would have been able to.
Climate change doesn’t create weather events, but it does allow high-impact events like the Fort Lauderdale flood to happen more frequently.
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