Chaos ensued in the United Arab Emirates after the country witnessed the heaviest rainfall in 75 years, with some areas recording more than 250 mm of precipitation in fewer than 24 hours, the state’s media office said in a statement Wednesday.
The rainfall, which flooded streets, uprooted palm trees and shattered building facades, has never been seen in the Middle Eastern nation since records began in 1949. In the popular tourist destination Dubai, flights were canceled, traffic came to a halt and schools closed.
One-hundred millimeters (nearly 4 inches) of rain fell over the course of just 12 hours on Tuesday, according to weather observations at the airport – around what Dubai usually records in an entire year, according to United Nations data.
The rain fell so heavily and so quickly that some motorists were forced to abandon their vehicles as the floodwater rose and roads turned into rivers.
This is kind of a myth, maybe if we think of loose sand like the Sahara, but dry ground acts very similar to paved ground. That’s why the mixture of long droughts and heavy rainfall are so devastating. The rain just washes over the dried hardened ground and causes flooding instead of getting soaked up and filling the ground water reserves.
Dubai is bordered by the Arabian Desert
Yeah, but it isn’t getting swallowed by dunes.
If you’ve ever been to that part of the world, it pretty much is.