Chapter 14

Flood hydrology

Outline:

• Types of floods (and examples)
  • Instantaneous flood releases
  • Channel overspilling floods
  • Tributary convergence floods
  • Rain-on-snow floods
  • Rainflal-ponding floods
  • Cloudburst flash floods
  • Sheetwash floods
  • Water table floods
  • Urban stormwater drain floods
• Tools for analyzing natural flow regimes
  • Flow magnitude tools
  • Flow frequency tools
  • Flow duration tools
  • Flow timing/predictability tools
  • Flow flashiness tools

Course Reader:

• Poff, N. L., Allan, J. D., Bain, M. B., Karr, J. R., Prestegaard, K. L., Richter, B. D., Sparks, R. E., and Stromberg, J. C. 1997. The natural flow regime. Bioscience 47:11:769-784. https://doi.org/10.2307/1313099.

Other reading:

• Watch the USA Today "Rain on Snow" movie

Related web links:

• California floods
  • CA flood information
  • Sacramento Bee Flood of '97 info
  • Marysville, CA 1997 flood pictures
• USA Today Hydrology home page- has excellent movies and explanations of flood processes.
• Darmouth flood observatory- keeps track of global flood conditions.
• Grand Canyon flood experiment
• North Dakota flood of '97
• National Weather Service Hydrologic Information Center
• Federal Emergency Management Agency

Video Podcast: Flood Hydrology, part 1

This 30-minute presentation describes and illustrates different kinds of floods that can occur.

• 640 x 480 (480p) format that balances speed and quality. (447 MB file)
• 1920 x 1280 (HD) format that provides larges size and best quality. (2.65 GB file)

Video Podcast: Flood Hydrology, part 2

This 27-minute presentation introduces the concept of the natural flow regime, defines its elements, and then gives specific examples of analyses that can be done to characterize it given a flow record.

• 640 x 480 (480p) format that balances speed and quality. (363 MB file)
• 1920 x 1280 (HD) format that provides larges size and best quality. (2.0 GB file)

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