en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_flood_of_1605
2 corrections found
the 1605 flood deposited a layer of silt two inches thick at the Santa Barbara basin, indicating that it was the worst flood event of the past 2,000 years
The underlying research does not support this wording: the 1605 layer was reported as 1–2 cm thick, not two inches, and later work identifies an A.D. 53 event as the largest flood in the 2,000-year Santa Barbara Basin record.
Full reasoning
The cited paleoflood literature does not say the 1605 deposit was "two inches thick." In the 1998 Quaternary Research paper A Large California Flood and Correlative Global Climatic Events 400 Years Ago, the abstract describes "a gray silt layer 1–2 cm thick" in the central Santa Barbara Basin, dated to A.D. 1605 ± 5 yr. That is substantially smaller than two inches (about 5 cm).
The second part of the claim is also overstated. That 1998 abstract says the 1605 event was "unmatched in the last 1000 yr", not that it was definitively the worst flood of the last 2,000 years. More recent research on Santa Barbara Basin sediments further contradicts the article's wording: the 2020 paper The Impacts of Flood, Drought, and Turbidites on Organic Carbon Burial Over the Past 2,000 years in the Santa Barbara Basin, California states that "The largest flood event in the record (53 A.D.)" may have accounted for 3% of total organic carbon buried, indicating that the biggest event in that 2,000-year record was not the 1605 flood.
So this sentence combines two errors: it inflates the reported thickness of the 1605 flood layer and overstates 1605 as the worst event in the full 2,000-year Santa Barbara Basin record.
2 sources
- A Large California Flood and Correlative Global Climatic Events 400 Years Ago
A gray silt layer 1–2 cm thick in the central Santa Barbara Basin, dated by varve counts to A.D. 1605 ± 5 yr, implies an intensity of precipitation ... unmatched in the last 1000 yr.
- The Impacts of Flood, Drought, and Turbidites on Organic Carbon Burial Over the Past 2,000 years in the Santa Barbara Basin, California
These 11 flood events are responsible for 15% of the TOC buried over the last 2,000 years. The largest flood event in the record (53 A.D.) may have accounted for 3% of the TOC buried alone.
being at least 50% more powerful than any of the others recorded based on geological evidence
The published Santa Barbara Basin record does not support this comparison. A 2020 study identifies the largest flood in the 2,000-year record as an event around A.D. 53, not 1605.
Full reasoning
This quantitative comparison is not supported by the underlying paleoflood record cited for Santa Barbara Basin.
The older 1998 study on the A.D. 1605 event describes a 1–2 cm flood layer and says it was "unmatched in the last 1000 yr". It does not establish that the 1605 event was "50% more powerful than any of the others" in the full 2,000-year record.
More importantly, later work directly conflicts with the claim that 1605 was strongest among all recorded events. The 2020 paper The Impacts of Flood, Drought, and Turbidites on Organic Carbon Burial Over the Past 2,000 years in the Santa Barbara Basin, California states that "The largest flood event in the record (53 A.D.)" may have accounted for 3% of total organic carbon buried. If the largest event in that 2,000-year Santa Barbara Basin record was around A.D. 53, then the article's statement that the 1605 flood was at least 50% more powerful than all the others is incorrect.
2 sources
- A Large California Flood and Correlative Global Climatic Events 400 Years Ago
A gray silt layer 1–2 cm thick in the central Santa Barbara Basin, dated by varve counts to A.D. 1605 ± 5 yr ... unmatched in the last 1000 yr.
- The Impacts of Flood, Drought, and Turbidites on Organic Carbon Burial Over the Past 2,000 years in the Santa Barbara Basin, California
These 11 flood events are responsible for 15% of the TOC buried over the last 2,000 years. The largest flood event in the record (53 A.D.) may have accounted for 3% of the TOC buried alone.