the.com/freshet
the river's adolescent growth spurt, swollen with snowmelt and bad decisions
means A sudden rise or overflow of a stream, usually caused by heavy rain or melting snow in spring.
from From Middle English, built on "fresh" — the same word for unsalted, newly-arrived water. A freshet is literally a gush of fresh water, the spring meltwater flooding into rivers and out toward the sea. The "-et" is a diminutive-flavored ending, so the word carries a sense of a little fresh outpouring, though the floods themselves are anything but little. "Fresh" traces back to Old English "fersc" and Germanic roots, a cousin of the same family that gave German "frisch."
- origin
- From 'fresh' — meltwater diluting salty estuaries
- timing
- Spring snowmelt and heavy rain trigger it
- power
- Carves channels and reshapes floodplains overnight
- old usage
- Once meant any small freshwater stream