TULSA, Okla. — Historic flooding conditions started setting up in Green Country on May 18, 2019.
So far this month, we've received 1.71" of rain at the Tulsa International Airport. This exact time in 2019, we'd already picked up nearly 5" and for the entire month of May 2019, Tulsa had about 13 inches of rain.
"The northeastern part of the state was the second wettest May on record," said Gary McManus, State Climatologist for Oklahoma.
The 2019 flood was the perfect recipe for disaster. Record rainfall in Kansas and northern Oklahoma put stress on the Kaw Dam and eventually the Keystone Dam.
"We had I think three stations in northern Oklahoma of the Oklahoma Mesonet that went above nineteen inches of rainfall," McManus recalls.
Aside from river flooding, we also have to pay close attention to flash flooding, especially because of the drought. The latest drought monitor map released on May 18, 2023 shows no drought in Tulsa, but abnormally dry to exceptional drought north and west of Tulsa.
"It's more of a danger when we get these big droughts for flash flooding more than river flooding because the ground is so hard. Any big rainfall events tend to run right off," said McManus.
It's not just spring season flooding we have to pay attention to, but also hurricane season later in the year.
Of course we watch systems in the Gulf of Mexico, but we also keep a close eye on Pacific Ocean systems too. Some of you might remember the impact of Pacific Hurricane Paine.
"It just had the perfect meteorological conditions to cause that flooding back in 1986," McManus recalls.
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