2018 Nor’easters in Coastal Massachusetts
Coastal areas of Massachusetts were severely impacted by the January 4 and March 2–4, 2018, nor’easters. The USGS cooperated with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to collect and publish total water-level data (the combination of tide, storm surge, wave runup and setup, and freshwater input) from high-water marks and continuous water-level sensors, to better understand the areal extent, timing, and effect of coastal flooding from strong storms.
To put the January and March floods into historical context, the USGS computed statistical stillwater elevations. Stillwater elevations recorded in January 2018 in Boston (9.66 feet above the North American Vertical Datum of 1988 [NAVD 1988]) have an annual exceedance probability of between 2 and 1 percent (between a 50- and 100-year recurrence interval). Stillwater elevations recorded in March 2018 in Boston (9.17 feet above NAVD 1988) have an annual exceedance probability of between 4 and 2 percent (between a 25- and 50-year recurrence interval).
The USGS and FEMA have created multiple outreach tools to convey the extent of these two events, including two USGS reports, a geonarrative, a video, a flood event dashboard for users to explore high-water marks and flood inundation maps relating to the storm, and a USGS data release that includes flood inundation maps and data available for download.
- Overview
2018 Nor’easters in Coastal Massachusetts
Sources/Usage: Public Domain.New England Water Science Center physical scientist scouting out high-water marks associated with the blizzard of January 2018. Houghs Neck Maritime Center, Quincy, Massachusetts.
Sources/Usage: Public Domain.Waves break between houses on White Cap Path in Sandwich, Massachusetts near high tide on Friday, March 2, 2018. Coastal areas of Massachusetts were severely impacted by the January 4 and March 2–4, 2018, nor’easters. The USGS cooperated with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to collect and publish total water-level data (the combination of tide, storm surge, wave runup and setup, and freshwater input) from high-water marks and continuous water-level sensors, to better understand the areal extent, timing, and effect of coastal flooding from strong storms.
To put the January and March floods into historical context, the USGS computed statistical stillwater elevations. Stillwater elevations recorded in January 2018 in Boston (9.66 feet above the North American Vertical Datum of 1988 [NAVD 1988]) have an annual exceedance probability of between 2 and 1 percent (between a 50- and 100-year recurrence interval). Stillwater elevations recorded in March 2018 in Boston (9.17 feet above NAVD 1988) have an annual exceedance probability of between 4 and 2 percent (between a 25- and 50-year recurrence interval).
The USGS and FEMA have created multiple outreach tools to convey the extent of these two events, including two USGS reports, a geonarrative, a video, a flood event dashboard for users to explore high-water marks and flood inundation maps relating to the storm, and a USGS data release that includes flood inundation maps and data available for download.
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