6 NE City Drinking Water Systems Knocked Out By Flood, Along W. Dozens Of Wastewater Plants

[hatrack]

Most of Nebraska is a disaster area with 95 percent of the state’s population affected by flooding. According to FEMA, total economic losses are approaching $1 billion, including more than $400 million to agriculture and more than $400 million to public infrastructure. Cascading levee failures along the Missouri River have meant that, for the time being, there’s essentially nothing holding back the floodwaters.

Six Nebraska public drinking water systems went offline, and dozens of wastewater treatment facilities failed — including one for Omaha which officials say could take weeks or months to restore. In several cases, raw sewage is being discharged into streams and rivers. For rural residents who get their water from private wells, that added pollution could prove dangerous. Emergency room visits for gastrointestinal issues increase after heavy rains.

As climate change makes rainstorms more intense, this problem will only worsen. Across the Great Plains, the frequency of heavy downpours has increased by 29 percent over the past 60 years. Flooding isn’t just a quickly damaging natural disaster that destroys roads, bridges, homes, and factories — it’s a lingering public health issue.

This problem isn’t unique to Nebraska. In recent years, floods in Texas, the Carolinas, and coastal Virginia have swept hazardous material from the petrochemical industry, hog farms, and agricultural land into waterways, threatening public safety. As of 2015, there were 772 cities — mostly in the Midwest and Northeast — with outdated sewer systems that funnel waste directly into streams as a matter of course even without record-breaking floods. These systems were cheap to build in the 1800s, but now people are starting to reconsider “combined sewer overflow” systems.

EDIT

https://grist.org/article/climate-change-nebraska-flooding-is-overwhelming-our-crappy-water-infrastructure/

[littlemissmartypants]

1. The evidence is still very visible in Eastern Carolina.

It's called the black line. It can be seen on buildings and trees. It's the water mark of some very nasty water that swept through towns and left a highly visible line when the water receded.

[hatrack]

2. This reminds me of an article I read a few days ago . . . .

Can't quite remember all the details, but the gist of it was that a couple living in Florida and concerned by sea level rise and increased potential for extreme weather was preparing to move to North Carolina - somewhere in the mountains, I believe.

Kudos to them for thinking ahead, particularly if they're living near the ocean. Having said that, and considering North Carolinians' experiences over the past 20 years (thinking all the way back to Floyd) I'm not sure the safety they imagine is really there.