{"id":30036,"date":"2024-04-19T02:27:57","date_gmt":"2024-04-19T02:27:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/04\/19\/dubais-extraordinary-flooding-heres-what-to-know\/"},"modified":"2024-04-19T02:27:57","modified_gmt":"2024-04-19T02:27:57","slug":"dubais-extraordinary-flooding-heres-what-to-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/04\/19\/dubais-extraordinary-flooding-heres-what-to-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Dubai\u2019s Extraordinary Flooding: Here\u2019s What to Know"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1050\" height=\"550\" src=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2024\/04\/18\/multimedia\/18cli-dubaifloods-bzkf\/18cli-dubaifloods-bzkf-facebookJumbo.jpg?fit=1050,550&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Dubai\u2019s Extraordinary Flooding: Here\u2019s What to Know\" title=\"Dubai\u2019s Extraordinary Flooding: Here\u2019s What to Know\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Scenes of flood-ravaged neighborhoods in one of the planet\u2019s driest regions have stunned the world this week. Heavy rains in the United Arab Emirates and Oman submerged cars, clogged highways and killed at least 21 people. Flights out of Dubai\u2019s airport, a major global hub, were severely disrupted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The downpours weren\u2019t a freak event \u2014 forecasters anticipated the storms several days out and issued warnings. But they were certainly unusual. Here\u2019s what to know.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"css-9ycfei eoo0vm40\" id=\"link-116ce41b\">Heavy rain there is rare, but not unheard-of.<\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">On average, the Arabian Peninsula receives a scant few inches of rain a year, although <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/linkinghub.elsevier.com\/retrieve\/pii\/S0169809519301735\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">scientists have found<\/a> that a sizable chunk of that precipitation falls in infrequent but severe bursts, not as periodic showers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">U.A.E. officials said the 24-hour rain total on Tuesday was the country\u2019s largest <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/wam.ae\/en\/article\/13vbuq9-uae-witnesses-largest-rainfall-over-past-years\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">since records there began in 1949<\/a>. But parts of the nation had experienced an earlier round of thunderstorms just last month.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Oman, with its coastline on the Arabian Sea, is also vulnerable to tropical cyclones. Past storms there have brought torrential rain, powerful winds and mudslides, causing extensive damage.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"css-9ycfei eoo0vm40\" id=\"link-4e0051ea\">Global warming is projected to intensify downpours.<\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Stronger storms are a key consequence of human-caused global warming. As the atmosphere gets hotter, it can hold more moisture, which can eventually make its way down to the earth as rain or snow.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But that doesn\u2019t mean rainfall patterns are changing in precisely the same way across every corner of the globe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In their <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ipcc.ch\/report\/ar6\/wg1\/chapter\/chapter-11\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">latest assessment of climate research<\/a>, scientists convened by the United Nations found there wasn\u2019t enough data to have firm conclusions about rainfall trends in the Arabian Peninsula and how climate change was affecting them. The researchers said, however, that if global warming were to be allowed to continue worsening in the coming decades, extreme downpours in the region would quite likely become more intense and more frequent.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<h2 class=\"css-9ycfei eoo0vm40\" id=\"link-526f6e69\">The role of cloud seeding isn\u2019t clear.<\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The U.A.E. has for decades worked to increase rainfall and boost water supplies by seeding clouds. Essentially, this involves shooting particles into clouds to encourage the moisture to gather into larger, heavier droplets, ones that are more likely to fall as rain or snow.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Cloud seeding and other rain-enhancement methods have been tried across the world, including in Australia, China, India, Israel, South Africa and the United States. Studies have found that these operations can, at best, affect precipitation modestly \u2014 enough to turn a downpour into a bigger downpour, but probably not a drizzle into a deluge.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Still, experts said pinning down how much seeding might have contributed to this week\u2019s storms would require detailed study.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cIn general, it is quite a challenge to assess the impact of seeding,\u201d said Luca Delle Monache, a climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif. Dr. Delle Monache has been leading <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.uaerep.ae\/en\/app\/page\/651\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">efforts to use artificial intelligence<\/a> to improve the U.A.E.\u2019s rain-enhancement program.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">An official with the U.A.E.\u2019s National Center of Meteorology, Omar Al Yazeedi, told <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thenationalnews.com\/news\/uae\/2024\/04\/17\/cloud-seeding-uae-rain-weather\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">news outlets<\/a> <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2024\/04\/17\/uae-denies-cloud-seeding-took-place-before-severe-dubai-floods.html\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">this week<\/a> that the agency didn\u2019t conduct any seeding during the latest storms. His statements didn\u2019t make clear, however, whether that was also true in the hours or days before.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Al Yazeedi didn\u2019t respond to emailed questions from The New York Times on Thursday, and Adel Kamal, a spokesman for the center, didn\u2019t immediately have further comment.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"css-9ycfei eoo0vm40\" id=\"link-799ee287\">Cities in dry places just aren\u2019t designed for floods.<\/h2>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Wherever it happens, flooding isn\u2019t just a matter of how much rain comes down. It\u2019s also about what happens to all that water once it\u2019s on the ground \u2014 most critically, in the places people live.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Cities in arid regions often aren\u2019t designed to drain very effectively. In these areas, paved surfaces block rain from seeping into the earth below, forcing it into drainage systems that can easily become overwhelmed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\"><a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-4441\/10\/5\/631\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">One recent study of Sharjah<\/a>, the capital of the third-largest emirate in the U.A.E., found that the city\u2019s rapid growth over the past half century had made it vulnerable to flooding at far lower levels of rain than before.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-798hid etfikam0\">Omnia Al Desoukie<!-- --> contributed reporting.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2024\/04\/18\/climate\/dubai-floods-what-we-know.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scenes of flood-ravaged neighborhoods in one of the planet\u2019s driest regions have stunned the world this week. Heavy rains in the United Arab Emirates and Oman submerged cars, clogged highways and killed at least 21 people. Flights out of Dubai\u2019s airport, a major global hub, were severely disrupted. The downpours weren\u2019t a freak event \u2014 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30037,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2024\/04\/18\/multimedia\/18cli-dubaifloods-bzkf\/18cli-dubaifloods-bzkf-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[34259,11118,16930,671],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30036"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30036"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30036\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30038,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30036\/revisions\/30038"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30037"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}