Reconstructing the 2015 Salgar flash flood using radar retrievals and a conceptual modeling framework in an ungauged basin

Abstract

On 18 May 2015, a severe rainfall event triggered a flash flood in the municipality of Salgar, located in the northwestern Colombian Andes. This work aims to reconstruct the main hydrological features of the flash flood to better understand the processes modulating the occurrence of the event. Radar quantitative precipitation estimates (QPEs), satellite information, and post-event field visits are used to reconstruct the Salgar flash flood, in an ungauged basin, addressing the relationship among rainfall spatiotemporal structure, soil moisture, and runoff generation during successive rainfall events by using a conceptual modeling framework including landslide and hydraulic submodels. The hydrological model includes virtual tracers to explore the role of runoff and subsurface flow and the relative importance of convective and stratiform precipitation in flash flood generation. Despite potential shortcomings due to the lack of data, the modeling results allow an assessment of the impact of the interactions between runoff, subsurface flow, and convective–stratiform rainfall on the short-term hydrological mechanisms leading to the flash flood event. The overall methodology reproduces the magnitude and timing of the La Liboriana flash flood peak discharge considerably well, as well as the areas of landslide occurrence and flood spots, with limitations due to the spatial resolution of the available digital elevation model. Simulation results indicate that the flash flood and regional landslide features were strongly influenced by the antecedent rainfall, which was associated with a northeasterly stratiform event. The latter recharged the gravitational and capillary storages within the model, moistening the entire basin before the occurrence of the flash flood event and impacting the subsurface–runoff partitioning during the flash flood event. Evidence suggests that the spatial structure of the rainfall is at least as important as the geomorphological features of the basin in regulating the occurrence of flash flood events.