How do humans increase the risk of floods?

Answer 1

Excessive rainfall, a burst dam or riverbank, unusually rapid snowmelt, and tidal surges are some immediate reasons for flooding. But what causes floods in one environment may be very different to what causes floods in another area.

In coastal regions storm surges - seawater swollen by intense rain and driven inshore by strong winds and waves - can be devastating, especially if natural breakwaters like coral reefs or mangrove forests have been destroyed. In urban environments, heavy rain rapidly runs off roads and pavements into drainage systems that sometimes cannot cope. In mountainous areas, trees and soils absorb water, but if the forests are cleared the land is vulnerable to erosion and heavy rain can lead to flooding, landslides, and clogging up of rivers with debris washed off the hillsides.

As climate change takes its course, wet areas are predicted to get wetter and storms to increase in frequency and intensity leaving flood-prone areas more vulnerable than ever.

Answer 2

One way could be cutting down trees.

Trees help control floods, without trees...the space is cleared and the flood is faster, with soil (can also make an ugly mudslide/flood)

By: Deon Robinson

Answer 3

People contribute to causes of floods by littering, polluting, overfarming, and cutting trees that protect riverbanks.

Answer 4

Monsoons can create floods and make rivers overflow

Answer 5

Humans pollute the atmosphere, which warms the earth, and the water, making hurricanes more likely, which cause floods.

Answer 6

.