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Focusing mechanisms in the Texas flash floods of 1978
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1981
[PDF-174.10 MB]
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Description:During the night of August 1, 1978, two days following the landfall of tropical storm Amelia, a stationary thunderstorm complex drenched the Hill Country of Texas and produced disastrous flash floods. The distribution of rain in central Texas, over the period 1-4 August, is depicted in Fig 1.1a. Heaviest rains fell in the headwaters of the Medina river near the town of Bluff (about 90 km northeast of San Antonio) with an unofficial total of at least 79 cm (31 in) during a 24 hour period (Fig 1.1b) and 122 cm (48 in) in the 4-day period. A recording rain gauge located near Medina shows the duration and some of the rainfall intensities associated with the Hill Country storm (see Fig. 1.1c). A shower had occurred there the previous morning, and rain again began to fall that evening at about 0000 GMT 2 August. Rain continued for about 12 h thereafter increasing in intensity until it ended abruptly at about 1200 GMT. During this period rainfall rates occasionally approached 100 mm h"1 (4 in h"1) with a more moderate average precipitation rate of 50 mm h"1 (2 in h"*). Heavy rains extended along the Balcones Escarpment into the neighboring watersheds of the Guadalupe and Sabinal rivers as well (20 km northeast and 30 km southwest, respectively, of Bluff, see Fig 1.2 for map of area). Flash floods in these three watersheds killed 27 people and seriously damaged or destroyed an estimated 370 homes.
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