The geology of eastern Kentucky was simply unable to handle the amount of rainfall that led to catastrophic flooding late last month. That’s according to Chris Barton, a professor at the University of Kentucky in the College of Agriculture, Food and Environment.
Barton explained that 60 to 70 percent of water that enters the watersheds in eastern Kentucky exits as stream flow and can quickly overwhelm larger waterways.
“You have hundreds of these feeding, you know, the sort of midsized streams that feed the Kentucky River. So Troublesome Creek, for instance, which had a lot of flooding and damage on it is fed by hundreds of these little headwater streams,” said Barton.
Barton has studied decades of research from Robinson Forest, located in parts of Breathitt, Knott and Perry counties.
“When you have a rainfall event that's twice, you know, the magnitude of anything that we've seen at Robinson forests over the last 50 years, you know, that the consequences are going to be catastrophic,” said Barton.
Barton said in an urban environment, the amount of rain that fell last month might cause concerns about storm water management. In these watershed areas though, Barton said the rain water continues downstream very quickly to larger waterways that then flood.
