Heavy rains caused road closures and several flood warnings in Mississippi on Thursday, a day after warnings were issued for parts of Arkansas and Louisiana.
About 13 inches of rain had fallen in Winston County by Thursday afternoon, according to the National Weather Service office in Jackson, Miss. The weather followed days of destructive flooding across the Northeast.
A flash flood emergency, indicating life-threatening danger, was in effect for cities including Louisville, Miss., which is in that county. Flash flood warnings were issued for other parts of the state. Winston County is about 100 miles northeast of Jackson.
“It was raining about three inches an hour,” Sarah Sickles, a meteorologist at the Weather Service office in Jackson, said Thursday afternoon, adding that “it’s still going on.”
Flooding was likely to continue into Thursday for much of the state, but the rain was expected to taper off late in the afternoon. More rain was expected on Friday, but it was not expected to be as intense, Ms Sickles said.
There were no immediate reports of injuries, Ms. Sickles said, but the Mississippi Department of Transportation and the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency told residents to avoid flooded roads in parts of Winston, Choctaw and Noxubee counties.
“DO NOT drive through flooded areas!” the transport agency wrote in a tweet.
In addition to road closures, there were reports of people being rescued from their homes, according to Ms. Sickles and the Winston County Sheriff’s office.
Photos on social media showed rising waters reaching the windows of homes and cars while also flooding businesses. At least one business roof collapsed due to heavy rain in downtown Ackerman, according to Dylan Hudler meteorologist at WCBI-TV who shared images of the damage.
The flood warnings came a day after the National Weather Service in Shreveport, La., warned that dangerous amounts of rain could affect counties in southwest Arkansas and northwest Louisiana.
The warnings came days after Vermont’s governor said flooding there was “historic and catastrophic” and storms in New York killed a 43-year-old woman.