The floods are already dangerous and threaten to be catastrophic. More than 100 people were rescued in Vermont, northeastern United States, authorities said Tuesday when a dam upstream from the city of Montpelier threatened to overflow.
At noon, the water level at the 1933-built and never overflowing Wrightsville Dam was less than 12 inches from its maximum after the Winooski River had flooded more than 13 feet in the past two days. A spill could have serious consequences for the city of Montpelier, where there is already up to 50 cm of water in the city center.
A dead human
The states of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Vermont were all the subject of flash flood alerts issued by the United States Weather Services (NWS) on Monday, warning these floods can be “deadly”.
A state of emergency has been declared in Vermont and several counties in New York, including Orange, where authorities have declared a state of emergency and confirmed the inclement weather caused one casualty, a 35-year-old woman.
“She went out, it seems her house took in too much water. She was with her dog and her fiancé saw her literally getting carried away,” New York State Gov. Kathy Hochul said at 1:30 a.m. north of New York in the village of Highland Falls, one of the hardest hit Villages.
“climate change”
The Democratic governor called on the population to “mobilize to fight against the devastating consequences of climate change, because these are once again unprecedented phenomena that hit us again and again”.
In upstate New York, torrential downpours turned the streets into torrents, washing away sections of roads and bridges and leaving people in their cars.
In places, rainfall of around 200mm caused “conditions that could be life-threatening due to flash flooding,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said.
More than 12,000 customers were without power as of Sunday night, according to the governor’s services, and 6,000 remained without power as of Monday morning, according to industry publication PowerOutage. Freeways were closed in at least five counties across the state as of Sunday night. And the Amtrak rail company suspended service between the state capital, Albany, and the city of New York “due to severe weather.”
If there are signs of a lull in the weather for two days, heavy rain is to be expected again on Thursday.