Pittsburgh's rainstorms are getting stronger
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Rainstorms are getting more intense in Pittsburgh and gaining power faster than any other Northeast city due to human-driven climate change, a new analysis finds.
Why it matters: More intense precipitation events can cause flash-flooding, landslides, dangerous driving conditions and other potentially deadly hazards.
Driving the news: Hourly rainfall intensity increased between 1970 and 2024 in nearly 90% of the 144 locations analyzed, per a new report from Climate Central, a research and communications group.
- Among the cities with an increase, hourly rainfall intensity rose by an average of 15%.
Zoom in: Pittsburgh rainstorm intensity is outpacing the national average, increasing by 27.9%.
- That's the largest in the Northeast region, and near the highest of any city east of the Mississippi River.
- Only Toledo, Ohio (28%) outpaced Pittsburgh among those cities.
How it works: The researchers divided each location's total annual rainfall by its total hours of annual rainfall, using NOAA weather station data.
- That approach quantifies how much rain fell for each hour it was raining in a given year — in other words, rainfall intensity.
Go deeper: Rainstorms are getting more intense amid climate change