A ghost lake that disappeared decades ago in California’s Central Valley has come back to life with a vengeance after torrential rains revived water bodies and flooded thousands of acres of farmland.
Lake Tulure, located in the Central Valley of California, was the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi River—but rivers feeding the system that had been dammed in order to divert it for irrigation and other uses by the 1920s—left the area dry.
Decades ago, communities and farms growing vegetables, cotton, and livestock began to occupy the dry lakebed—one such community is Corcoran in Kings County.
Known as the agricultural capital of California, Corcoran now faces its farms, residents, and even a local prison flooded by the high waters of the lowlands.
It comes as massive snowpacks that accumulated on the Sierra Nevada during the winter threaten more floods that are likely to triple by summer, threaten communities and could cost billions in damages.
A ghost lake that disappeared decades ago in California’s Central Valley has come back to life with a vengeance after torrential rains revived water bodies and flooded thousands of acres of farmland. Aerial view of a house on resurfaced Tulare Lake
Tulure Lake (pictured), wedged between San Francisco and Los Angeles, was once the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi River — but rivers feeding the system that were dammed in order to divert it for irrigation and other uses by the 1920s — left the area parched
A stream of atmospheric rivers, along with record snowpack melt, has caused water levels to rise around Corcoran, pushing the dams that surround the community to their limit.
“All the crops were flooded and completely destroyed,” said resident Martina Celli. CNN.
It takes a lot of jobs for people. That’s a lot of food we serve up and down California and all over the country. It’s very scary.
That’s just from the rain. But when the snow melts, there is nowhere else to turn here.
Daniel Swain, a UCLA climate scientist, told the outlet that the Earth has “actually sunk in some places by 10 or 15 feet over the past decade.”
This has altered the topography of the historic lake bed. Some places are even lower than they were the last time there was a major flood.
Sidoño Palmerin told CNN that he remembers “the last big flood in 1983” and how the drought took nearly two years.
“We have lost half of our students in schools and about a third of our city’s population,” he said.
Many people who have been relocated have lost their homes and cars. It took a long time to recover.
Buildings and vehicles were partially submerged after a dam failed in Manteca, San Joaquin County, as atmospheric river storms battered California.
Satellite images taken over the past six weeks have revealed the resurgence of Lake Tulare, showing how it suddenly flooded and settled across miles of land.
City officials are trying to keep the water out by raising 14.5 miles of dams by 3.5 feet through levee construction, and the city hopes for a more gradual runoff.
City officials are trying to keep the water out by raising 14.5 miles of dams by 3.5 feet by building dams, and the city hopes for a gradual runoff.
Because a layer of clay may prevent water from flowing quickly into the aquifer below, the timeline for when the waters will recede and when farmland will return is still uncertain.
“God willing, this will protect the town of Corcoran,” said Sheriff David Robinson of King County.
We’ve been lucky with a very slow and mild spring so far. But we know the heat is coming.
“This season’s thaw is going to be like a super marathon, and we’re just getting started on the first mile,” said the National Weather Service in Reno.
Satellite images taken over the past six weeks have revealed the resurgence of Lake Tulare and showed how it suddenly flooded and settled across miles of land.
At its widest point the lake stretches about 10 miles from shore to banks, according to photos provided to NBC News by Planet Labs.
More than 1,200 buildings in Tulare County, which lies roughly halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco and about 78 miles inland, have been damaged by the floods so far.
May-July projections from the Climate Prediction Center show that most of the western United States will experience warmer temperatures during those three months, along with an average amount of precipitation.
It comes as massive snowpacks that accumulated on the Sierra Nevada during the winter threaten more floods that are likely to triple by summer, threaten communities and could cost billions in damages.
Big Pine Fire Department firefighters are seen working to dig a fire hydrant buried in a snow bank in the Sierra Nevada mountains, after another storm system brought heavy snowfall in late March
said Daniel Swain of the University of California, Los Angeles USA Today that while there are no extreme snow-melt events currently on the horizon for the next 1-2 weeks, there is still a record amount of snow water that should fall sometime between now and the middle of summer.
The US Drought Watch told the outlet that the snow-water equivalent level in California is a record 258 percent higher than normal.
Another atmospheric warm river storm is still possible in the next few weeks, Swain added, as is a potential heat wave in May.
This story will continue to be a major story in the coming weeks even as the rest of the state dries up and recovers from the devastating and disruptive events of this winter, and midsummer flood risks may persist in some areas subject to direct snowmelt runoff.
