Severe Floods Hit Northeast US

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Facts

  • Extreme rainfall slammed the northeast US Sunday, leaving over 9M people under flood alerts in parts of New York, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Maine. The storms also prompted road closures, water rescues, and urgent warnings about life-threatening flash floods.1
  • According to authorities, one woman in her 30s died in Orange County, New York.2
  • Airports across the region, including Boston's Logan and New York's LaGuardia, saw hundreds of flights canceled or delayed, and N.Y. Gov. Kathy Hochul issued states of emergency in at least two counties.3
  • Amtrak services between New York City and Albany were suspended, with one train being halted near Poughkeepsie after there had been a "complete washout of both tracks" south of the city. Trees and debris were also covering Metro-North tracks, suspending trains between Croton-Harmon and Poughkeepsie.4
  • In Pennsylvania, more than six inches (15 cm) of rain were recorded in some areas, with Reading, Pa. marking its wettest July day on record Sunday with 5.35 inches (13.59 cm) of rain recorded. Some areas saw upwards of eight to 12 inches.5
  • 12K homes throughout New York state were left without power, and the West Point Military Academy says nearly 7 inches of rain fell in three hours, making it a once-in-a-millennium rain event in that location. Flood warnings and watches dotted New York state and New England as the system moved through the region Monday.6

Sources: 1CNN, 2New York Times (a), 3Reuters, 4New York Times (b), 5NBC, and 6BBC News.

Narratives

  • Narrative A, as provided by The Conversation. Increasingly severe rainstorms and flooding are clearly linked to global warming and climate change, as warmer weather allows air to hold more moisture. This, coupled with more snowmelt in mountainous regions, has led this issue to impact all regions of the US and the world. If we want to save lives and billions of dollars in damage, we must implement policies to cool the global temperature.
  • Narrative B, as provided by Competitive Enterprise Institute. Climate and environmental disasters have been predicted by modern-day doomsayers for decades, but what we are seeing now are natural cycles. From 'the next ice age' to world-ending droughts, none of the apocalyptic predictions have come true so far; why would this time be any different?

Predictions