We Cannot Let Disastrous Rainfall Become Our New Normal

The recent flooding in Spain mirrors Hurricane Helene’s impact on the U.S.

By Ray DePaul

12/29/2024

Flooding in Valencia, Spain (NASA Earth Observatory)

Heavy rainstorms surged in the Southeastern Spanish city of Valencia, just two weeks after deadly flooding began to plague this stormy season. With the flooding taking nearly 200 lives and another heavy rainfall warning for the Valencia area released on Wednesday, we can only wonder if this is the future we will see globally as a result of climate change.

Spain’s Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, announced early last week that he would add $4 billion to the initial €10.6 billion flood relief package. Despite criticism from the Spanish public over his response to the deadly floods rampaging across the country, Sanchez claimed the government would provide the necessary resources indefinitely.

The phenomenon attributed to this, DANA, is an acronym for “Depresión Aislada en Niveles Altos,” translated as isolated depression at high levels. Polar region winds combine with hotter surface temperatures from Summer in the Mediterranean, thus causing warm air to rise and moisture content to accelerate, resulting in “heavy storms and torrential rain.”

While this is a locally understood occurrence, a changing climate and harsher weather patterns have undoubtedly made things worse in recent years. Over the past 20 years, this region has experienced worse weather events in November and September, while October (previously the highest) has more than halved previous numbers.

20-year differences in rain-related events in Southeastern Spain. (Source: climameter.org)

In fact, in addition to some areas receiving up to 20 inches of rainfall, it is reported that other areas received a year’s worth of rain over one storm. So, what gives?

“As a result of rising temperatures, the hydrological cycle has accelerated. It has also become more erratic and unpredictable, and we are facing growing problems of either too much or too little water. A warmer atmosphere holds more moisture which is conducive to heavy rainfall,” World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Secretary-General Celeste Saulo said in an Oct 7 press release.

Each Celsius degree of warming causes saturated air to contain seven percent more water vapor on average, according to the WMO. Subsequently, extreme precipitation events will become more frequent with each portion of the atmosphere being warmed.

Even domestically, in the same vein of exacerbated meteorological events, North Carolina was one of many US states to bear the brunt of category four Hurricane Helene in late September.

The state’s western portion received upwards of a foot of rain, with some areas even reaching 18 inches. Over three days, rainfall total amassed to around 30 inches in the most affected areas, and around 96 citizens died as a result of the storm. Officials called it the “deadliest storm in the state’s history.”

North Carolina’s Office of State Budget & Management estimated that the storm’s damage totaled more than $53 billion. Across the 2024 fiscal year, this number is double what the state allocated to education.

Both of these two storms paint a bleak picture of what our future may look like given no improvements to meet goals established by the Paris Agreement. Storms that breach the line of inconvenience to life-threatening danger like the aforementioned two will surely only become more frequent and more deadly.

The U.N. listed both Spanish rainstorms and Hurricane Helene as inspirations for clean energy alternatives becoming an increasingly top-of-the-list item going into its annual climate summit, COP 29. This is the bare minimum of a world seeing these storms slowly destroy vulnerable communities and economies. Within the last two decades, damage caused by climate-related emergencies has amounted to $500 billion globally.

The cost of dealing with these problems as they arise – instead of creating strategies and implementing policies to mitigate these disasters – is only doing us a disservice. The corporate greed of our world prevents action and bars the progress that is necessary for handling climate change and the myriad of ways it will affect billions of humans.

As 2024 closes, we cannot accept these weather events as the “new normal.” Not only should this be a priority for governments worldwide, but there must be action that proceeds discussion at world forums like COP29.