A study on the occurrence of flood events over Jammu and Kashmir during September 2014 using satellite remote sensing

During the first week of September 2014, the Jammu and Kashmir region witnessed devastating floods across the majority of its districts, caused by multi-day heavy rainfall events. According to data provided by the Home Ministry of India, several thousand villages across the state were hit and 390 villages completely submerged. The preliminary assessment of property damage was estimated between INR 50,000 million to INR 60,000 million. Approximately 277 people died. In this study, an effort was made to analyze the heavy rainfall events over Jammu and Kashmir using hourly data at the fine spatial scale from satellite remote sensing. Data over Jammu and Kashmir reveal strong diurnal variation in rainfall over the severely affected districts. Most of these districts experienced continuous frequent heavy rainfall rates in the range of 15-22 mm/h during the first week of September 2014. The results show that the cumulative rainfall during 2-6 September 2014 may have contributed to the flood events.