Tropical Storm Debby, which struck Florida yesterday morning as a hurricane, continues to march very slowly up the East Coast, bringing soaking rains and catastrophic flooding with it. Over the next several days, what’s left of Debby will slowly make its way into New England by the weekend, dropping tens of trillions of gallons of water along the East Coast before it completely exits the country.
According to the National Hurricane Center (NHC), potentially historic heavy rainfall across eastern South Carolina through Friday will likely result in areas of catastrophic flooding. Heavy rainfall will likely result in considerable flooding impacts from central to the Upstate of South Carolina, western North Carolina, Southwest Virginia through portions of Mid-Atlantic States, western and northern New York State and northern New England through Saturday. 20-30″+ of rain is expected across the coastal southeast while 4-10″ is possible across portions of the interior Mid Atlantic and Northeast.
Tropical storm wind conditions will spread northward along the southeast U.S. coast from northeastern Georgia to North Carolina through Thursday. Tropical storm warnings and watches are in effect for portions of that area.
A dangerous storm surge is possible along the coast of South Carolina and southeastern North Carolina from South Santee River to Cape Fear. “Residents in that area should follow any advice given by local officials,” says the NHC in their latest storm update.
