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Heavy rainfall and flooding causes a ground stop at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport

By Scott Bachmeier •

GOES-16 “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images, with an overlay of the Total Precipitable Water derived product [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

5-minute GOES-16 (GOES-East) “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images with an overlay of the Total Precipitable Water (TPW) derived product (above) showed a pocket of high moisture — with TPW values in the 2.0-2.3 inch range — just northeast of a quasi-stationary front that was draped across lower Michigan during the nighttime hours preceding sunrise on 24 August 2023. As a Mesoscale Convective System was expanding south-southwestward from Ontario into Ohio, it produced an outflow boundary that moved to the northwest across lower Michigan — and that outflow boundary appeared to play a role in enhancing the development of new thunderstorms that then moved southeast across the Detroit (METAR identifier KDTW) area.

GOES-16 “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images, with 15-minute METAR surface reports plotted in cyan [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

A closer look at GOES-16 Infrared images as the thunderstorms moved across the Detroit area is shown above with plots of 15-minute surface reports, and below with plots of 1-hour Precipitation Accumulation. Detroit Metro Wayne County Airport (KDTW) and Detroit Willow Run Airport (KYIP) as well as Monroe (KTTF) had rainfall rates in excess of 1.5-2.0 inches per hour at times. Total rainfall accumulations from these storms were as high as 7.36 inches in Wayne County and 6.80 inches in Monroe County.

GOES-16 “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) images, with 1-hour Precipitation Accumulation plotted in cyan [click to play animated GIF | MP4]

The heavy rainfall led to flooding of roadways and tunnels leading to KDTW (below) — which resulted in a brief ground stop of air traffic (media story) until the flooding subsided and roads could re-open allowing access to the airport.

GOES-16 “Clean” Infrared Window (10.3 µm) image at 1151 UTC, with Local Storm Reports plotted in cyan [click to enlarge]

Categories: Aviation, GOES-16, Heavy rain / flooding