August 11, 2024 – Last week, Tropical Storm Debby dropped over 800 billion pounds of rain (or 10 inches of rain per square miles) onto Sarasota County, Florida and almost twice as much in areas that received up to 18 inches of rain over a span of two days. Homes and cars were flooded from the relentless rain including older settled areas along Phillippi Creek and in newer residential communities on former low-lying and flat cow pastures and mucklands that were formerly used to grow celery. After the storm, some of these new residents could not drive away from their homes for several days due to the lingering high water on surrounding roads. A real frustration and worse for both new and long-term homeowners.
In Southwest Florida due to its flat topography, it takes intricate stormwater modeling and precise earth contouring for new development communities to control the flow, volume and timing of water release downstream to avoid flooding neighboring properties. Only the top levels of man-made lakes and preserved wet prairies and sloughs actually have limited storage capacity to handle major rainfall events like the one that occurred last week. Also, the tropical vegetation growth entangle the flow of water in creeks and the water diverts over the bank and floods adjacent homes.
Debby was a monster storm that impacted many as it went up the Eastern Seaboard. The intensity and expanse of the storm are indeed one for the weather history records. However, through my eyes as a former wetland biologist who spent years in wetland muck, the special topography with its environmental systems of wet prairie and sloughs within Sarasota County were created by such storms for millions of years. The rain is needed to recharge the aquifer and sustain wetland plants and soils.
The Natural Floodplain of the Myakka River
For our “Debby” experience, our backyard had some flood waters when the Myakka River crested over 96 hours after the storm (longer than I expected after living near the river since 1987) but the elevation from the peak cresting of the flood waters was lower in our backyard (north of S.R. 72) and took more time than that of Hurricane Ian almost two years ago. Those downstream, however, experienced structural flooding as well as our neighbors to the north located near Howard Creek that flows into the Myakka River. It was amazing to see three days after the storm that there was white water rushing water which is an unusual event in SW Florida.
The Myakka River is a Florida Wild and Scenic River and its expansive natural floodplain and watershed have been and continue to be protected, in appreciation to the efforts of multiple governmental agencies, environment advocates, property owners and farmers who all have worked together for decades in protecting its floodplain and surrounding upland habitats through preservation and recorded agricultural conservation easements. The entire protected area is called the Myakka Island currently consisting of over 110,000 protected acres. When the floodplain is full, I enjoy watching more wildlife (bobcats, turkeys, deer and even gators) travel on drier ground past the glass French doors of the AquaNew office.