ELI5- How does only 17″ of rain cause multiple feet of floodwater?

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My little girl is 7 and just isn’t wrapping her head around this and I need to find a better way to explain this.

She is so so smart because she saw the coverage of Helene, and heard 17″ and hot confused.

I told her the water runs from the high places to the low places, but then she asked why the water doesn’t leave the low places and why is it still flooded.

I’m bad at dumbing things down.

In: Planetary Science

17 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

17” is a lot of rain. Keep in mind that the ground is rarely flat, and water flows downhill. The area of ground that flows towards a creek or river is called the “catchment area,” and all of the flowing water in the entire catchment area will eventually make it to the river. So that 17” times the entire catchment area can result in a very large volume of water, more than the river actually can handle within its banks.

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