California threatened by new flood phenomenon

Rain falling on Christmas Eve in California is not unusual–the American state receives half of its precipitation between December and February. But when the skies opened back in December 1861, they didn’t close again for more than a month. Over a period of 43 days, more than three metres of precipitation fell. Thousands of people lost their lives, and more than 800,000 head of cattle drowned. The damage was so extensive that the state of California went bankrupt six months later.

The meteorological explanation of that extreme precipitation level has been a long time coming. Only now do scientists claim to fully understand what happened in California in that winter of 1861/2. The phenomenon has been termed an “atmospheric flood”, a term which