The flood that occurred in the late summer of 2013 in the Far East is a truly extraordinary phenomenon, a natural disaster of the greatest scale, so soon after it began, some people began to talk about the apocalypse. Nevertheless, floods of this magnitude have happened before, it is still too early to think about the end of the world.
Flooding in the Far East
At the end of July 2013, the Far East (Russian territory) and northeast China were devastated by natural forces. Over a fairly large area, extensive floods occurred, and the discharge of water in the largest rivers increased significantly.
The Amur River, the normal flow rate of which is 18-20 thousand cubic meters. m. per second, rose so much that the water consumption reached 46 thousand cubic meters. per second, which is almost three times the norm.
Indeed, floods of this magnitude have not happened in this region for a long time. It is believed that this happens once every few centuries, and the last equally strong flood happened about 115 years ago. But impressionable people with the onset of serious cataclysms quite often tend to think that the beginning of the apocalypse has come.
Flood reasons
The climate in the Far East is partly monsoon, and the rainy season begins just at the end of July and lasts all August. This alone would have been enough to foresee the possibility of floods at this time. Cyclones come from the sea, which "get stuck" among the mountains until the clouds empty all their reserves. With such a phenomenon, the direction of the wind is constantly changing, new clouds come to replace the previous ones, the rain pours in an endless stream. This is usually the case, but a flood as severe as it happened in 2013 had additional causes.
Cyclones and anticyclones obey the mechanism of self-regulation of air masses, which from year to year behaves more or less constantly, which determines the very concept of climate. But in 2013, the balance of this mechanism was somewhat upset. In the western part of the Pacific Ocean, a high-pressure anticyclone hovered, which did not allow anticyclones from the Amur region to leave the Far Eastern territory. It turned out that by July 2013 a stationary zone had formed over the Amur region, in which strong tropical cyclones saturated with moisture “hovered” for two months.
The settlements of Russia in the Far East were badly damaged, but only one person died. China was less fortunate, more than a hundred died, and the same number went missing.
Due to constant rains, all areas of the Amur River basin, prone to floods, are overflowing with moisture. Usually floods occur in one or more of them, but in 2013 there was so much water that all flood areas were overflowing.
The fact that the winter from 2012 to 2013 was very snowy, and spring came late, also played into the hands of the floods. The soil was already saturated with water beyond measure, the rains only finished the job.
Hydrologists believe that one of the limiting factors that has prevented flooding in the past is vast forests, which in recent years have been severely damaged by logging and uncontrolled fires.
