Water hazards are something that every property owner ought to be aware of. Whether you own a home or a business, you should be aware of the ways in which water can damage your property. Nothing is worse than having your property flooded and not knowing it was in danger until the water has destroyed your possessions or done extensive damage to the structure.
Flooding, storm surges, hurricanes and typhoons, heavy rainstorms (deluges), coastal erosion, and tsunamis and storm waves are all examples of water hazards.
The damage can be devastating in any case. Frozen pipes and ice dams, which can both result in an “internal flood” that can cost a lot of money can also cause water hazard inside your property.
Water hazard means an open body of water with a horizontal dimension of more than one hundred metres and a depth which is above one metre.
Flood damage is not covered by most insurance policies, so it’s important to know if you are in a flood-prone area before buying a house. Flood insurance is required if you have a mortgage and live in a 100-year flood zone.
For billions of people, water—oceans, seas, storms, and rain—is a source of beauty, inspiration, and recreation. Like a lot of natural processes, these systems’ wild grandeur, which can sometimes become dangerous, contributes to their beauty. Since nearly half of the world’s population lives within 100 miles of a coastline, water hazards have the potential to affect almost everyone. At the University of Washington, Natural Hazards is a group of scientists and researchers who work on a variety of water-related risks, each with their own specialization, such as extreme precipitation, regional climate change, roads, and mountain snow melt.
The Following Are Types Of Water Hazards:
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Enhanced and Catastrophic Flood Risk:
Extreme precipitation can occasionally fall in excess of a region’s “maximum” precipitation. Small creeks, streams, and even ponds can quickly become floodwaters when there is a large volume of water. Some hazard companies offer Enhanced Flood Risk Model and Catastrophic Flood Risk Model for unusual circumstances:
Enhanced Risk Model: What takes place when a region experiences the potential maximum precipitation
Catastrophic Risk: What takes place when a region experiences twice the potential maximum precipitation
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Storm Surge:
Although floodwaters typically originate from rivers, they can also originate from the ocean. The term for this is “Storm Surge.” Hurricanes cause storm surges because of the strong winds, changes in pressure, and circular motion of the storm. As a result, a wall of water forms along the system’s front edge. That water “surges” over the land if the storm turns in the right direction. The HazardHub Storm Surge Model considers five levels of intensity, with Level 1 allowing for the impact of smaller storms and Level 5 containing the strongest storms.
The potential inundation level, which is an estimate of how high the water will rise on your property, is also provided by HazardHub. The most important thing is for property owners to prevent flooding from Hurricane Storm Surges.
This means identifying potential risks on their properties and making plans ahead of time on how they would deal with this kind of flood. When a disaster strikes, you will experience less stress if you are better prepared! You can also make an evacuation plan so that you already know what to do if things get worse than expected.
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Sea level rise:
One of the most feared potential outcomes of climate change is sea level rise. Ocean levels may rise and flooding may become severe as climate change continues. Since water expands as it warms, thermal expansion brought on by ocean warming and increased melting of land-based ice, such as glaciers and ice sheets, are the two primary contributors to global sea level rise. Storm surges can push even further inland as sea levels rise, and the frequency of nuisance flooding like king tides can rise as well. Municipalities and property owners need to be aware of the effects of sea level rise on them so they can prepare and plan accordingly.
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Frozen Pipes:
Many property owners face the issue of frozen pipes on a regular basis. This happens due to a lack of insulation and can cause pipes to burst, making the house uninhabitable for weeks or even months while they wait for a service repair.
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Ice Dams:
These are ice ridges that develop along your roofline. The ice can get in the way of water trying to drain off your roof, causing it to get stuck and blocked. The roof, attic, ceilings, and walls of your home may suffer significant damage as a result of this backed-up water leaking into your property. The misery is made worse by the fact that it usually occurs when it is extremely cold outside.
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Tsunamis:
An underwater geologic disturbance like an earthquake, volcano, or landslide is what causes tsunamis, which are a series of enormous, seismic sea waves. In the open ocean, these enormous waves can travel at speeds of hundreds of miles per hour and can slam into our coastlines with waves greater than 100 feet. Along the Pacific Ocean’s “Ring of Fire,” a geographically active region where tectonic shifts make volcanoes and earthquakes more common than in other places, tsunamis can have a significant impact on coastal towns and the people who live there.
A tsunami model that mimics the movement of water was developed this year by two UW mathematicians and their collaborators. Their model was recently used to create the nation’s first tsunami refuge structure on the roof of an elementary school in western Washington.
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Floods:
These are one of the most common natural hazards in the United States and around the world and can occur anywhere it rains. Flood conditions can result from hurricane systems, full levees, outdated, clogged, rapid rainfall accumulation, and other factors. Flooding can be extremely large, affecting entire river basins and multiple states, or it can be local, affecting just one neighborhood or community. While some floods happen slowly, flash floods, the most common weather-related death in the United States, can happen quickly and frequently bring large rocks, trees, and rushing water.
The natural hazards team at the University of Washington focuses on floods. The cutting-edge climate, ocean, and fisheries research conducted by JISAO paves the way for more intelligent policy discussions and a public that is more knowledgeable about the environment.
Large earthquakes can trigger underwater landslides thousands of miles away, weeks or months after the quake occurs, according to new research.
A series of underwater landslides on the Cascadia Subduction Zone were linked to a magnitude-8.6 earthquake that occurred more than 8,000 miles away in the Indian Ocean in 2012, according to data analyzed by researchers using ocean-bottom seismometers off the Washington-Oregon coast. After the April earthquake, these intermittent underwater landslides occurred for nearly four months.
Some of these hazards are natural while others are human induced such as the ones associated with water Experimental visualization.
There is only a superficial difference between floods and floating ice emergencies and dangerous pollution-related situations. The former are frequently brought about by human activity, whereas the latter are frequently brought about by natural factors. Phenomena that are typically purely natural may, from time to time, be exacerbated by human intervention or even entirely caused by it. For instance, human activities like the construction of canals or dams or land use practices like deforestation, which leads to unnaturally rapid run-off, can either cause floods or make them worse.
On the other hand, nature and human activity can coexist to cause disastrous outcomes, such as dam flooding caused by earthquake damage. As a result, there is a range of possibilities, from completely natural to completely man-made.
