Dubai flooded due to record rainfall. After this 24-hour rain flood, speculation about ‘cloud seeding’ or artificial rainfall with the help of technology – as the reasons for rain – has spread, which is kind of confusing.
But guess what, exactly how unusual was this rainfall in Dubai and what were the main reasons behind such heavy rainfall?
How ‘strong’ was the rainfall?
Dubai is located in the coastal region of the desert country of the United Arab Emirates.
Dubai is generally very dry. The average annual rainfall is less than 100 mm. However, sometimes Dubai also experiences extreme rainfall.
Al-Ain city is only 100 km away from Dubai. 256 mm rainfall was recorded there in 24 hours.
A steady low pressure forms around the cumulus clouds in the sky. As a result, warm and humid air accumulates there. Other weather elements cannot enter there. In meteorology, this is called a ‘cut-off low pressure weather system’.
Rainfall patterns in the Gulf have been studied by Professor Maarten Ambaum, a meteorologist at the University of Reading. About this rainfall in Dubai, he said, ‘This part of the world remains without rain for a long time, this is its characteristic. However, there is irregular and heavy rainfall here. Still it was a very rare rainfall event.’
Does climate change have a role?
It is not yet possible to accurately measure the extent to which climate change has played a role in causing such rainfall in Dubai.
A full scientific analysis of the natural and man-made factors is needed to say for sure, which will take months. But with the way the climate is changing, this rainfall is consistent. Simply put, generally warmer air can hold more moisture. Every degree Celsius of temperature increases holds about 7 percent more moisture, which can increase rainfall intensity.
Richard Allan, professor of climate science at the University of Reading, explained, ‘The intensity of the rain has broken records. But it has to do with the warming of the climate. Because such air contains more moisture, which leads to storm formation and heavy rainfall, and the resulting floods become increasingly stronger.’
According to a recent study, due to global warming, by the end of this century most of the UAE could increase by up to 30 percent. “If people continue to burn oil, gas and coal, the climate will continue to warm, rainfall will increase and people will lose their lives in floods,” said Dr. Frederick Otto.
Cloud seeding and flooding
Cloud seeding is a technological process that affects the existing clouds in the sky to produce more rain.
Cloud seeding can be done by aircraft. For this, small particles of silver iodide are released into the clouds by airplanes. Then the water vapor condenses easily and turns into rain. The technique has been used worldwide for the past few decades and the United Arab Emirates has also used cloud seeding to tackle its water crisis in recent years.
However, in the hours after the floods started in Dubai, social media users were wrongly blaming the extreme weather there only on the recent cloud seeding operation carried out in the country.
Flooding in the United Arab Emirates and the country’s Dubai began on Tuesday. Meanwhile, a Bloomberg report earlier said that the aircraft used for cloud seeding in the country were not deployed on Tuesday, but on Sunday and Monday.
However, the BBC could not independently verify when the cloud seeding took place. Experts say it can have little effect on storms if it’s too high, and that it’s “misleading” to focus on cloud seeding for flooding. Generally, if moisture and dust in the air prevent precipitation, cloud seeding is used. But just last week weather forecasters warned of a severe flooding risk across the Bay Area.
‘When such forecasts are made, an expensive process such as cloud seeding is not applied. Because then there is no need to implement such strong measures,’ said Professor Diana Francis, head of the Department of Environment and Geophysics at Khalifa University in Abu Dhabi.
BBC Weather meteorologist Matt Taylor also said that extreme weather in Dubai had been predicted in advance. “Prior to this event, computer models predicted very well that a year’s worth of rainfall could fall within 24 hours.”
Matt Taylor said, ‘If I just calculate the rain from cloud seeding, it turns out that the impact of the flooding was much more widespread. From Bahrain to Oman, this vast area experiences severe flooding.’
Even if the cloud seeding was done in the United Arab Emirates (if) the flood of remembrance did not occur only in that country. Rather it flooded from Bahrain to Oman. The cloud seeding mission in the Emirati region is managed by a government task force called the National Center of Meteorology (NCM).
How prepared was the Emirates?
Strong defenses are needed to control the situation so that heavy rains do not turn into deadly floods.
In terms of infrastructure, Dubai is definitely a developed city. But there was very little green space to absorb moisture from the air and the drainage system was not strong or developed enough to handle such heavy rainfall.
“Adapting to this new reality (frequent and intense rainfall) requires appropriate strategies and adaptation measures,” said Professor Francis.
“For example, road infrastructure and other facilities should be adapted to rainfall, reservoirs should be created to store water from seasonal rains and use it at other times of the year.”
In January, the UAE Roads and Transport Authority formed a new unit to deal with the flood situation in Dubai.
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