IVT: The Invisible Force Behind Deadly Floods

When catastrophic flooding hits, we usually look at rainfall totals and records broken. But what if the most important number comes before the rain ever starts?

In this episode, meteorologist Emily Gracey explores a groundbreaking Washington Post investigation that reveals how massive flows of atmospheric moisture are intensifying across the globe, creating hotspots that turn storms into deadly floods. Using a powerful metric called Integrated Vapor Transport (IVT), the reporting shows that the real story isn't happening on the ground...it's happening way above our heads.

Emily sits down with Washington Post meteorologist Ben Noll, who spent a year analyzing the data behind "Deadly Rivers In The Sky." Together, they unpack how rising global temperatures have supercharged the movement of moisture through Earth's atmosphere, why certain regions now face grave risks of extreme rainfall, and what this means for communities from Appalachia to Spain.

Floods can be sudden, devastating, and hard to recover from. But what if the real story isn't just the rain that falls, but the moisture in the sky that never used to be there?