New Hampshire has been soaked by record-breaking rainfalls this month.
Over a foot fell on to the southwest part of the state alone.
And all that water has to go somewhere.
Some of it is swelling the state’s rivers and streams, but much of it is filling the aquifers.
New Hampshire Public Radio’s Kerry Grens has more.
Find out where the water is going by clicking on the links below.
Rise of groundwater level at Pembroke well
Rise of groundwater level at Warner well
Stream flow in New Hampshire for October
In general, most rainwater seeps into the ground.
During spring and summer, half of it is taken up by trees and the other half trickles down into aquifers and feeds streams and rivers.
But in the fall and winter, part of that equation is missing.
The leaves are off the trees and they stop sucking up the water.
Larry Dingman is a professor emeritus at the University of New Hampshire.
Dingman: Once the leaves are off the trees, the responses of groundwater and streams are more immediate and more pronounced.
So pronounced that they are breaking records.
According to the US Geological Survey, on October ninth, the Cold River in Drewsville was running at one hundred fifty times its usual flow.
And the river’s height doubled its previous recorded maximum.
Hydrologist Richard Moore says the chart topping numbers are evident for ground water as well.
Moore: What we’ve got here for the month of October the level in the Warner well is actually a record. It’s higher than the highest that’s been measured at the end of the month since 1969.
The USGS monitors wells around the state every month, and the one in Warner is tracked every fifteen minutes.
There, the water height graph for October spikes upward showing that the well has swelled about two feet.
But even though these water levels are exceptional for October, they would be normal for the spring.
Moore: It can handle it. Where it would have more problems is if you got a big storm on top of a spring melt off. But the fact that this is occurring during a time when the water levels typically are at their lowest it helps to absorb all that water.
Still, with the trees shut down for the season, streams will run high until the ground water levels drop.
USGS hydrologist Keith Robinson says it could take months.
Robinson: I would think that if we have normal rainfall and snowfall over the next 6 months our water levels are going to stay high because we’re going into the winter season with high water levels. So there’s a good chance they may stay high over the next six months.
This means a higher risk of flooding.
But without any more unusually heavy rains or snows, the hydrologists expect things to return to normal by spring.
And they say it’s actually a welcome situation to enter into the winter with high water levels.
Most of the time they’re dealing with drought.
SOQ
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