It is the first time in 84 years that the state of California, in the southwest of the US, has had to deal with a tropical storm.
Huge amounts of rain
The US weather services expect Hilary to continue to lose strength soon. The main danger lies in the enormous amounts of rain that are expected. In some places, 250 millimeters of rain can fall in a few hours. That is what normally falls there in a year.
The American Hurricane Center warns people not to underestimate the storm. “The fact that he is declining in strength does not lessen the danger,” said deputy director Jamie Rhome.
First fatality
In Mexico, the storm seems to have made its first fatality. In the town of Santa Rosalia, a person drowned when his or her car was swept away by a stream of water that swept through the streets.
Death Valley, the driest place on the entire continent, is located in the middle of the expected path of the storm and could even temporarily turn into a lake due to the expected flooding, expects meteorologist Thijs Smink van Buienradar.
Extra dangerous is that the storm will mainly move over mountainous desert areas. Although it is much less densely populated than the megacities of Los Angeles and San Francisco, the risk of flooding is even greater for the towns and villages that are located there, because desert soil can hardly absorb any water. Smink: “A dry river bed can turn into a swirling river.”
2023-08-20 17:52:07
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