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Cleanup in Maryland town after deadly flash floods

A submerged auto is visible in the Patapsco River, seen from the Howard County side of Patapsco Valley State Park after the sidewalk caved in due to Saturday night’s flooding in Ellicott City, Md., Sunday, July 31, … “In the past, it has been bad”. They got out of the vehicle but Watsula couldn’t make it to safety.

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Governor Larry Hogan declared a State of Emergency for Howard County, making it eligible to receive state assistance and putting in motion the process to obtain federal disaster aid. “But we are just going to promise them that we are going to provide all the resources that we can to help them”.

‘The man who got washed away was incredibly lucky, ‘ she said of the rescuer closest to the auto.

The county courthouse and government headquarters are located in Ellicott City but are on higher ground.

A pastor says a woman killed by flash flood waters in Ellicott City, Maryland, was the single mother of a 10-year-old girl. In the video, a man instructs a small group to form a human chain and together, they pull a woman from her auto in the midst of rushing waters.

“I will never forget that because that tells me what the people of Ellicott City are like”.

“There were incredible rescues… people being rescued out of cars with human chains reaching from restaurants to try to get people out of cars”, Hogan said.

Baltimore County police said Sunday that the victims were 35-year-old Jessica Watsula of Lebanon, Pennsylvania, and 38-year-old Joseph Blevins of Winsor Mill, Maryland.

Arditti’s business, Still Life Gallery, was also affected by the flood waters.

Once they left the restaurant, they managed to start the vehicle and drive slowly out of town. At one point, said Eric Minton of Centreville, Virginia, the concourse was so jammed that “people can’t move”.

A rise of more than 13 feet was recorded on the Patapsco River in Ellicott City in a few hours time Saturday evening.

The county has evaluated 200 of the buildings downtown and found that four or five are destroyed, while another 20 to 30 are heavily damaged, said Robert Frances, director of the of the county Department of Inspections, Licenses and Permits.

The community sits on a county line, which runs down the still-flooded Patapsco River, making recovery efforts more complicated. More than 170 vehicles were stranded in the Main Street area and along the river.

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Kittleman said in the aftermath of the storm, the city looked like a “war zone”.

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	The woman’s car is seen stranded in the torrential flood water