City Hall Issues Palafox Flooding Response

Rick Outzen

8 hours ago

Stormwater

City Says Palafox Flooding Was a 13-Minute Snapshot of a 500-Year Storm

Public Works data shows only one block—between Garden and Romana—saw significant standing water, and the city’s engineer says no drainage system in America could have handled Saturday’s rainfall intensity.

Viral videos of water lapping over the curb on South Palafox Street told only part of the story, according to analysis from Pensacola’s Public Works and Engineering Department.

City officials reviewed the rain event from last Saturday afternoon and its impact on Palafox Street. Their conclusion: Of the five blocks that make up the New Palafox project site, only one—between Garden and Romana—saw substantive standing water, and that impact lasted just 13 minutes.

The City collected video from downtown businesses.

The video timeline:

2:04 p.m.—water visible over the curb near the Brent Building
2:10 p.m.—water begins to recede
2:17 p.m.—no standing water visible

In an official statement released Tuesday after, the City stated, “While it made for meme-able social media footage and one media report, using only video from that window of time does not reflect the state of the entirety of Palafox Street that afternoon.”

Why the city says the flooding happened at all.

Weather monitoring stations installed at City Hall in 2015 recorded rainfall intensity downtown that exceeded a 500-year storm event over a 30-minute period Saturday afternoon. Rain gauge data provided by the city shows the storm dropped 1.7 inches of rain in 30 minutes—an intensity equivalent to 9 inches per hour.

Over a full hour, the storm produced a peak rainfall intensity of 4.7 inches per hour.

By comparison: Hurricane Sally, which hit downtown Pensacola in 2020, produced a peak one-hour rainfall intensity of 2.76 inches per hour. Saturday’s storm exceeded that intensity by a wide margin—without a named storm attached to it.

“There is no stormwater collection and conveyance system in America that can pass the flow generated from a storm event of that magnitude,” said City Engineer Brad Hinote.

City officials emphasize that rainfall intensity—not just total volume—is what drives localized flooding. How fast rain arrives and enters the drainage system matters as much as how much falls.

Saturday’s storm ran from 1:34 p.m. to 3:44 p.m., dropping a total of 3 inches of rain over 2 hours and 10 minutes.

What happened once the rain stopped: Both during and after the storm, water dissipated into the system quickly enough that businesses on Palafox remained open and served customers as they would on any other Saturday evening. No business owners reported water intrusion to the city.

Where the city says the real chokepoint is—and it’s not theirs.

Engineering staff point to the intersection of Garden and Palafox as a historic chokepoint for runoff flow in that area. That intersection is Florida DOT infrastructure and was outside the scope of the New Palafox project. The block that saw the most flooding sits directly south of it.

City officials say they’ll continue working with FDOT to find ways to improve that intersection’s infrastructure.

Complete City Statement

City Public Works and Engineering has conducted an analysis of the rain event last Saturday and its impact on Palafox Street.

Of the five blocks of the New Palafox project site, only one block, between Garden and Romana, saw substantive standing water. After data and video analysis, city officials confirm the area of significant impact was for a 13-minute period on that single block.

Video footage shows water over the curb near the Brent Building at 2:04 p.m. The water begins to recede at 2:10 p.m. By 2:17 p.m. there is no standing water visible.

While it made for meme-able social media footage and one media report, using only video from that window of time does not reflect the state of the entirety of Palafox Street that afternoon.

Weather monitoring stations installed at City Hall in 2015, show our downtown received a rainfall intensity in excess of a 500-year storm event in a 30-minute period on Saturday afternoon. Rain gauges, with the data provided attached here, show Saturday’s storm dropped 1.7 inches of rain in 30 minutes. The rainfall intensity of that 30-minute period was the equivalent of 9 inches per hour.

For a one-hour duration, Saturday’s storm produced a peak rainfall intensity of 4.7 inches per hour.

By comparison, Hurricane Sally in 2020 produced a peak rainfall intensity of 2.76 inches per hour for a one-hour duration in downtown. As such, the peak intensity from Saturday’s rain event well exceeded that of Hurricane Sally.

“There is no stormwater collection and conveyance system in America that can pass the flow generated from a storm event of that magnitude,” according to City Engineer Brad Hinote.

Rainfall intensity is an important factor in localized flooding. The amount of rain that falls matters, but so does how quickly that rain arrives and enters the drainage system.

Saturday’s rain event lasted from 1:34 p.m. to 3:44 p.m. The entire storm dropped 3 inches of rain in 2 hours, 10 minutes.

Both during the storm and once the deluge stopped, the rain dissipated into the system, allowing businesses on Palafox to remain open, serving their customers as they would on any Saturday evening. No business owners reported to the City that they had water intrusion in their businesses.

Engineering staff note that the intersection of Garden and Palafox – which is Florida DOT’s infrastructure and was outside the scope of the Palafox project – historically acts as a chokepoint of runoff flow in that area. The block of Palafox that saw the most impact is directly south of this intersection.

City officials will continue to work with our DOT partners to look for ways that their infrastructure in this intersection can be improved.