My friend and Arizona Water Buffalo, John R. Parsons, made this post on Sept. 18, 2014. I thought it was interesting. Of course things have changed by now. If you want to view his up-to-date weather and river analyses, his posts are public at John R. Parsons on Facebook. UPDATE #8: The San Pedro peaked at Eighteen Five (18,500 cfs) at 10:15 am today. It has topped and it now back to only 17,000 cfs. What a ride! (BTW, thats more than TWICE this mornings flow of The Colorado River at Lees Ferry!) UPDATE #7: Yeah, its definitely trying to put a top together at this level. See the screen clip of the data feed in the comments section below. Seventeen Seven! WOW! UPDATE #6: Amazing but true. The San Pedro at Palominas is 17,700 cfs. It does, however, look like its beginning to think about topping at this level so the 1940 All Time record of 22,000 cfs appears safe. Still...there are actually very few people alive today who would have actually witnessed the the 1940 flood. Amazing stuff from a 737 square mile watershed. (UPDATE #5: Update #4 was deleted. The USGS Gage had a hiccup but its working again and WOW--16,900 cfs and still rising. Todays flow is now the #2 All Time High Flow for this gaging site. Were not talking just for today, folks, were talking ALl Time for the period of record of this gage, regardless of calendar date. Only the August 14,1940 flow of 22,000 cfs stands above todays flow. Just for comparison--two numbers: The median flow for this date is 8 tenths of a cfs. Meanwhile, the Colorado River at Lees Ferry right now is only 9,160 cfs! UPDATE #3: When streamgages get near their operating limits, data generally becomes more unreliable. Thats just one reason why its called provisional data. Anyway, the flow is still listed as 15,700 but the gage height now shows 18.05 feet. This might be the first indication that the San Pedro is peaking at the Palominas gage. UPDATE #2: Its nearing the upper limit of the USGS gages operating capacity. Its 19.09 feet and the gages measuring limit is just about 20 feet. The San Pedro at Palominas has risen approx. 15 feet since yesterday. UPDATE #1: Its now up to 15,700 cfs, which puts it into #4 position on the All Time Flow List for this gaging station. If it can tack on another 300 cfs, it will move into #3 position, behind only 1940 and 1958. (INITIAL POST) The Upper San Pedro is two feet above flood stage right now, flowing an eye-popping 13,600 cfs at Palominas. This water is flowing into the San Pedro from Sonora in Old Mexico. Thats where Odile dropped quite a load late yesterday. The rain that fell in Mexico is just now making its grand entry into the US. There are only 737 square miles of the San Pedro upstream from the Palominas gaging station. At this point, the San Pedro is still rising. At the 13,600 cfs level, there are only five years with higher flows: 1940, 22,000 cfs; 1958, 16,500 cfs; 1978, 14,500 cfs; 2001, 15, 900 cfs and 2006, 14,200 cfs. Its entirely possible the San Pedro at Palominas could exceed the 1978 and 2006 high water marks, thereby putting it Top Five All Time flow records for that gaging station. The graphics are all self-explanatory.
Posted on: Thu, 18 Sep 2014 22:00:24 +0000
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