Latest Flood Stories

April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The Soviet government has long kept outsiders away from the Russian Far East, shrouding a source of powerful earthquakes and volcanic activity on the Pacific Rim in secrecy. In the last 20 years, however, research has shown that the Kamchatka Peninsula and the Kuril Islands are a seismic and volcanic hotbed. This area has the potential to trigger tsunamis that pose a risk to the rest of the Pacific Basin. As an example, in...

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online New storm surge barriers are being proposed to help protect Lower Manhattan in New York City from storms such as those like the recent Superstorm Sandy. Catherine Seavitt Nordenson, associate professor of landscape architecture in CCNY's Spitzer School of Architecture, is calling for the deployment of a storm surge strategy that combines elements of soft infrastructure with the hardening of existing infrastructure like the...

Free Flood Damage Check will tell car buyers whether or not a vehicle has experienced flood damage in the U.S. LONDON, ON, Nov. 19, 2012 /CNW/ - As people along the U.S. coastline work to clean up after Superstorm Sandy, thousands of flooded vehicles will be pulled out of the water, most of which will likely be declared flood-damaged. This means that a vehicle will be given a 'flood car' status on its vehicle title and from that point on, this status will be visible to anyone...

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online India’s monsoons are a godsend for the country’s vital agricultural sector, providing life for crops which more than a billion people rely on. But a grim forecast for the future may spell doom for the nation’s food production and economy, as summer rains will be more sparse over the next few hundred years due to global warming. A new study by researchers at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Potsdam...

COLLEGE PARK, Md., Nov. 1, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A University of Maryland study projects that Washington, D.C., city and federal property could suffer billions of dollars in damage if sea level rise from global warming increases over the next century. Potential for significant damage will be even greater in the event of extreme weather like Hurricane Sandy. The study by Civil and Environmental Engineering Professor Bilal Ayyub, Haralamb Braileanu and Naeem Qureshi, of the...

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Scientists have found evidence of a deadly tsunami that inundated coastal Switzerland in AD 563 after a rockfall near the River Rhone swept Lake Geneva. A wall of water 42 feet high crashed the shore, destroying villages along the coast and killing people and livestock, according to historical accounts of the incident. Scientists now say that Geneva and Lausanne remain vulnerable to similar events today, as do other cities on the...

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Based on new extrapolations from historical data, a group of international researchers has found that tropical cyclones are larger and more frequent during years with higher average temperatures. Published this month in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists’ report shows historical trends for cyclones that occurred before the use of modern day satellite and radar tracking systems that have...

New research suggests that cutting down swaths of forest in snowy regions at least doubles - and potentially quadruples – the number of large floods that occur along the rivers and streams passing through those forests. For decades, the common perception in hydrology has been that deforestation in such areas made seasonal floods bigger on average, but had little effect on the number of large floods over time, said geoscientist Kim Green of the University of British Columbia. But a new...

The use of data from Earth-observing satellites in the insurance business is still in the early stages, but pressure to be ready for more frequent extreme-weather events is increasing. Flooding is expensive for the insurance and reinsurance market. Last year’s flood in Thailand cost the insurance industry $15–20 billion – the most expensive flood ever in terms of insured losses. Accurate and timely information about a flood’s extent can help insurers to assess the impact and...

ZURICH, September 6, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Flood losses are increasing at an alarming rate, while the insurability of floods provides unique challenges for the industry according to Swiss Re's latest report, Flood - an underestimated risk: Inspect, inform, insure [http://media.swissre.com/documents/Flood.pdf ]. Coinciding with the release of the publication is the release of a flood app for iPads. To view the Multimedia News Release, please click:...