California To See More Major Storms In Coming Decades, MIT Scientists Say
SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) – Just as the National Weather Service is telling the Bay Area to prepare for this weekend's monster storm, scientists at MIT said California could see an increasing number of major storms in the future.
Researchers took a look at California's extreme storms like one in December of 2014. It was another "Pineapple Express" that dumped 3 inches of rain on the Bay Area in an hour and was dubbed the "Storm of the Decade."
Using large scale future projections and factoring in policies to restrict global warming, researchers said the Bay Area could see more of those kinds of storms on a seasonal basis.
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"I'm sure that you're hearing about risks of flooding, landslides, those sorts of things with this impending storm," Adam Schlosser, senior research scientist at MIT's Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change.
"These are the sorts of things you're going to have to be more prepared for," Schlosser told KCBS.
Schlosser said a better emergency network is needed. "Some sort of more resilient infrastructure or a response system," he said.
The researchers based their projection on an average global temperature rise of 7 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century.
"It's going to be a different situation for California, the West Coast, by mid-century and beyond if we continue on this path," Schlosser said.