Michigan's Great Lakes water levels may do something only achieved 4 times in last 154 years

Mlive.com ^ | October 09, 2014 | Mark Torregrossa

[cripplecreek]

Lake Michigan and Lake Huron water levels may do something only achieved four times in the last 154 years.

This time of year is normally the season when Great Lakes lake levels begin to fall. Typically evaporation is greater than precipitation and runoff from rivers and streams. So there is normally less water going into Lakes Michigan, Huron, and Superior at this time of year. On Lakes Michigan-Huron July is typically the high water month. Lake Superior usually sees peak water level in July or August.

This year is different. Lakes Michigan-Huron, and Lake Superior have continued to rise, even up to now.

Lakes Michigan-Huron have risen 3.1 inches since July. Normally those lakes would have dropped 2.8 inches since July. Lake Superior has risen 1.8 inches, while normally dropping 1.2 inches since July.

When we look at the current rise in levels on Lake Michigan-Huron versus the normal fall, we may have just gained almost six inches. In other words, if all of the rest of fall and winter go exactly normal, Lake Michigan-Huron will start next season's water rise six inches higher than last spring. And that's if everything is normal.

[bigbob]

Everything is!

[OneWingedShark]

Anybody know where I can buy cheap plans for an ark?

No need for that:

(Genisis 9:1-17)
God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you shall rest on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of the air, on everything that creeps on the ground, and on all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and just as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. Only, you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. For your own lifeblood I will surely require a reckoning: from every animal I will require it and from human beings, each one for the blood of another, I will require a reckoning for human life.

Whoever sheds the blood of a human,
    by a human shall that person’s blood be shed;
for in his own image
    God made humankind.

And you, be fruitful and multiply, abound on the earth and multiply in it.”

Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, “As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark. I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

[mia]

Having lived on the Eastern side of the great lakes my whole life, frequently at this time of year we get greater precipitation because the cooler air flowing over the warmer water picks up moisture and drops on the land. It’s called “lake effect.” I’m surprised at this headline because this is a normal accurance.

[cripplecreek]

A rainy fall doesn’t seem terribly unusual to me either.

[cyclotic]

I grew up in St. Clair Shores. In the ‘70’s water levels were so high, the Army Corpse (intended) built 4 ft. high dykes along the shoreline.

[Celtic Conservative]

I heard there’s a used one you could get cheap on Mt. Ararat. In good condition, only used for forty days and forty nights.

CC

[SamAdams76]

What this basically means is a lot more lake-effect snow this winter. With more water, it will take longer for the lakes to freeze over and thus more snow will be produced.

[Bob Mc]

" Lakes Michigan-Huron have risen 3.1 inches since July. Normally those lakes would have dropped 2.8 inches since July. Lake Superior has risen 1.8 inches, while normally dropping 1.2 inches since July."

Here in Texas we measure unusual lake rise and fall in feet, not inches!

[SWAMPSNIPER]

It’s a racist plot!

[SWAMPSNIPER]

I thought Rosie O’Donnel was taller than that!

[cyclotic]

Bada bing, I’m here every night, two shows on Sunday, try the veal.

[OldMissileer]

Just wait until this winter when it ices over like last year. The levels will get even higher so next summer you better have a canoe ready at your front door. :-)

[cripplecreek]

This is already less than 50 feet from my front door on an inland lake.



That's Michigan. Great Lakes surrounding swamps and inland lakes. Kinda like Florida with ice.

[HandyDandy]

The only ice in Florida is in the drinks.

[pieceofthepuzzle]

One thing I find astounding about the Great Lakes is that there are huge salt mines under several of them. A large percentage of the salt produced in the US comes from mines under the Great Lakes. I think I’d have a hard time working in an environment that I knew was beneath billions of gallons of water.

[tcrlaf]

I remember the Lake Effect Thunderstorms from a few years ago that dumped many inches of rain on Northern Indiana over a week period.

Driving up 65 close to the lake, it looked exactly like snow bands, but they were thunderstorms forming over the warm land, from the cold lake air.

It was eerie.

[Wuli]

“Lake Michigan-Huron has never had its high water mark in November. If that happens, we really know we have a bizarre weather pattern.”

“Bizarre” ONLY if your time-frame is a few human lifetimes, but not if your time-frame is the whole history of the lakes.

It really just gets me furious all the time that the current modern ignorant populist notion about climate is that only what humans have observed in their brief historical memories, in climate, is considered the norm, and anything else, that may in fact have come and gone many times over the ages is considered “bizarre”.

Are most people really that dumb? Do they really think that what they know as “normal” is the weather, or climate that the earth has always had and “should” always have?

[cripplecreek]

Salt deposits.



And other useful stuff.

[kaehurowing]

Damn that global warming!

[Alberta's Child]

Look at the size of those Great Lakes, though. Can you imagine how many gallons it would take for Lake Superior to rise one foot?