PENSACOLA, Fla. (AP) — As people in the Florida Panhandle and southern Alabama cleaned up in the wake of Isaias, heavy rainfall was bringing the risk of flooding Sunday across the central Appalachians and the mid-Atlantic region as the storm's remnants moved north.
Heavy rainfall could cause localized flash flooding and urban flooding across the region, with river flooding continuing in western North Carolina, according to the National Weather Service.
Tornadoes were possible in parts of Virginia and North Carolina, and life-threatening surf and rip current conditions were expected to continue along the Gulf and southeastern Atlantic coasts.
“We’re expecting that heavy rainfall to continue here across the central Appalachians into the mid-Atlantic here during the day on Sunday, and we’re still expecting isolated flash and urban flooding, and there may be also some residual gusty winds associated with the system as it continues to kind of move up the spine of the Appalachian Mountains,” said Philippe Papin, a senior hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
At least four deaths were linked to the storm, including two people killed when trees fell onto homes in Florida and Alabama. The first hurricane of the Atlantic season, Isaias came ashore as a Category 2 hurricane Friday near Destin, Florida, a Gulf Coast vacation spot filled with high-rises and tourist shops. The storm then roared farther into Alabama with tropical-force winds.
In Burke County, North Carolina, officials said there was a water rescue on the Catawba River behind a high school just after 8 a.m. Sunday.
An unhoused male and female were camping when the water rose and caught them off guard. "Both individuals and their dog were rescued and are safe now,” according to a spokesperson for the county emergency management agency.
Nearly a dozen local weather stations in the western North Carolina county reported torrential 24-hour rainfall totals at 9 a.m. Sunday, from about 5 inches (13 centimeters) to as much as 9.57 inches (24 centimeters) at the fire/rescue station in Enola. The National Weather Service said rainfall was diminishing in the area but that rapid river rises and flooding remained possible.
Hurricane-force winds in the Florida Panhandle blew the roof off a Pensacola hotel, and the city’s mayor said the airport “took some damage.” The storm flattened a boathouse in Destin and ripped away part of the facade of a high-rise in Panama City Beach.
At a church in Pensacola where the United Cajun Navy was distributing supplies Sunday morning, a line of hundreds of cars stretched around the block. Yvette Haro said she arrived at 5 a.m. after being turned away the previous day because supplies had run out.
With a 10-year-old son and a 5-year-old daughter at home, she said it's hard to go to stores and wait in long lines. She was looking for water, paper towels, toilet paper and cleaning supplies.
“Anything that they’re willing to give us is helpful,” she said.
While her home didn't suffer any damage, the loss of electricity was making things difficult, Haro said. “The biggest thing is our food going bad. It’s really hard to keep grilling everything and then where do we store all this food?”
Nearly 390,000 customers were without power Sunday in southern Alabama and the Florida Panhandle, according to poweroutage.com.
In Florida’s Escambia County, Sheriff Chip Simmons said a woman was killed when a tree fell on her home and a man died of carbon monoxide fumes from a generator running in his garage. Four of the man’s family members, ranging in age from 4 to 72, were treated but were expected to survive, the sheriff said.
One person died when a tree fell on a house in Birmingham, said Cory Moon, the city’s fire chief. A second storm-related death in Alabama was attributed to a motor vehicle crash involving a downed tree in Barbour County, said Josh Johnson of the state’s emergency management agency.
Along Alabama’s Gulf Coast, authorities in Mobile reported numerous downed trees and power lines.
President Donald Trump approved an emergency declaration for Georgia after earlier doing the same for Florida and Alabama, allowing for federal aid.
The U.S. Energy Department authorized emergency exchanges of crude oil from the nation’s strategic petroleum reserve to address disruptions in supply because of the storm.
Meanwhile, in the Pacific, Simon was a Category 4 storm with winds at 150 mph (241 kph) as it approached Mexico’s coast. Simon was expected to bring heavy rainfall beginning Sunday to parts of southwestern Mexico with life-threatening flooding and mudslides.
Rachel was also expected to bring heavy winds and rain to northern Mexico and Southern California after becoming a post-tropical cyclone overnight, Papin said.
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Associated Press reporters Julie Walker in New York and Kathy McCormack in Concord, New Hampshire, contributed.
