Record Rains Phoenix
Phoenix metro area (entire valley) received heavy rain in the early morning hours of September 8th 2014. This is the most rain the valley has received in one day on record.
No flooding in our home. We are dry! The soft ball field in our community as well as the golf course, were under water. The retirement community we live in (Sunland Village East) has several retention ponds. that catch all of the run off water. These retention ponds have been requirement of the new development areas since the early eighties (???). When they develop new master planned communities they disguise the retention ponds as community parks. Every hundred homes or so has to have a park area that will hold a calculated amount of water ( I don’t know for sure how this is calculated). Many of the old areas of phoenix and surrounding cities, don’t have retention ponds to catch the water.
The rain was much needed (just not all at once). Hopefully, it refilled the lakes. What was unusual about this heavy rain is that – it covered the whole valley and continued to move north. All of the rain up north in the mountains, will end up in the valley as well. So, the potential for more severe flooding continues.
Being from the mid-west originally (Minnesota). It was quite funny to see how everyone reacts. The storm flooded freeways and closed schools throughout the valley. The desert ground is like concrete because of the scarcity of rain. This rain all has to go some place with no storm sewers.
There is a slim chance for more rain tonight. The good thing about all of this, are the cooler temperatures (-21 from normal). The pictures below are from the 55+ golf community that my wife and I live in (Sunland Village East).