By Vivian La , Grist.  Excerpt: Flooding across northern Michigan last month pushed rivers to record levels, testing the limits of the state’s aging dams so severely that officials in one city nearly ordered evacuations as water threatened to spill over the top of a key barrier — a close call that highlights the growing risk that intensifying storms pose to similar infrastructure around the country....  Full article at https://grist.org/extreme-weather/close-calls-at-michigans-dams-are-a-climate-warning-to-america/ . 

By John Surico  and  Nick Underwood , The New York Times.  Excerpt: The waters surrounding New York allowed it to grow into an economic powerhouse. But what has been a blessing is increasingly a threat, as flooding becomes one of the city’s greatest challenges. Projections that model future flooding in the city show that it will only get worse. By 2080, many areas will face an increased risk of  tidal flooding  because of rising sea levels. At the same time, more neighborhoods will become vulnerable to  extreme rainfall . And wide swaths of the city face increasing peril in the event of  storm surge  from a hurricane. By 2080, nearly 30 percent of the city’s land mass could be  at risk of significant flooding . Some 1.4 million New Yorkers currently live in these areas — 17 percent of the city’s population. New York’s adaptation is a matter of survival. Climate experts have recommended several strategies. The city could increase its ability t...

By Rebecca Owen , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: In consulting rainfall data from 2001 to 2020, the researchers designated a hazardous flood event as one that had an average recurrence interval of 2 or more years.... They compared their findings to the flooding events documented in the  NOAA Storm Events Database  and  Dartmouth Flood Observatory  (DFO) database. Their analysis captured 3 times as many flooding events as the DFO database did and identified an additional $320 million in damages. ...This study also considered heat events, or periods in which the wet-bulb globe temperature exceeds a  30°C health threshold  rather than a given percentile. Using this definition, the researchers determined that between 2003 and 2020, Texas experienced 2,517 days with a heat hazard event—nearly 40% of all days. Heat hazard events affected a total of 253.2 million square kilometers....  Full article at https://eos.org/research-spotlights/scientists-reveal-hidden-heat...

By Nina Lakhani , The Guardian.  Excerpt: The  four-day historic storm  that caused death and destruction across the central  Mississippi  valley in early April was made significantly more likely and more severe by burning fossil fuels, rapid analysis by a coalition of leading climate scientists has found. ...The floods were caused by rainfall made about 9% more intense and 40% more likely by human-caused climate change, the  World Weather Attribution (WWA) study  found. Uncertainty in models means the role of the climate crisis was probably even higher....  Full article at https://www.theguardian.com/us- news/2025/may/08/storms-mississippi-valley-climate-change-study . 

By Kimberly M. S. Cartier , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: Consistently implementing zoning, permitting, and building regulations, all commonplace municipal tools, helped most New Jersey towns avoid floodplain development. New Jersey is one of the most flood-prone U.S. states, and climate change is increasing the hazard by raising sea levels and supercharging severe storms like Hurricane Sandy. The state also faces pressure to develop new housing and infrastructure, often in low-lying inland and coastal areas that are the most vulnerable to flooding. Despite this pressure, a recent analysis of new floodplain development found that 85% of New Jersey towns built relatively little in floodplains over the past 2 decades. Towns achieved this by applying routine land use management tools consistently over time, a slow but steady approach to climate adaptation. ...The most effective way to avoid  flood  damage to homes and infrastructure is to avoid building in a floodplain. ...Instead,...