– The head of the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency says 56 people remain in a shelter because their homes are flooded.
Advertisement
Many of those who were stuck were from out of state, suddenly finding themselves caught up in south Louisiana’s 2016 flood.
On the ground, it was just as catastrophic. Drivers tried to navigate treacherous roads where the water lapped at the side or covered the asphalt in a running stream.
Shoes, children’s toys and household items floated through knee-deep water outside his home.
Best said the water is still rising.
Emergency workers in Louisiana have rescued more than 7,000 residents stranded in homes and cars during a historic flood, governor John Bel Edwards said Sunday.
The recovery stage, when teams begin ripping out drywall and carpets from flooded homes, remains several days away, said Edwards, who was scheduled to tour the area Monday.
“This is a serious event”, Governor John Bel Edwards said of the “historic” record floods.
LSU sports information director Michael Bonnette asked the public for help on Twitter on Sunday and said Hawthorne couldn’t be reached on his cellphone.
He said the fatalities have not risen from the three dead reported on Saturday.
A 68-year-old man died Friday after slipping into a flooded ditch near the city of Zachary, and the body of a 54-year-old man was found in St. Helena Parish, where crews pulled him from a submerged pickup on Louisiana Highway 10, authorities said. Two nursing homes were being evacuated.
The federal government has declared a major disaster in four parishes following widespread flooding across southeastern Louisiana. In Jefferson Davis Parish, so many roads are impassable that Sheriff Ivy Woods declared a 6 p.m. curfew so motorists don’t get stranded overnight.
The body of a 40-year-old woman was recovered Saturday afternoon.
“People are surprisingly upbeat”.
“Get my dog, get my dog”, she said, her frantic voice, choked with water.
Just as the auto was sucked under water, becoming submerged, a rescue worker reached the vehicle and dove into the water on the driver’s side to help.
Louisiana is calling on the federal government to help deal with the fallout from the unprecedented floods that hit the state over the past week.
The evacuees included Gov. Edwards and his family, who were forced to leave the Governor’s Mansion when chest-high water filled the basement and electricity was shut off.
A woman and her dog were rescued from a auto sinking in floodwater by men who arrived on a boat at the ideal time.
The woman, not visible in the video broadcast on Sunday by local television station WAFB, shouts, “Oh my God, I’m drowning!”
The video shows the man pulling a woman to safety and then also saving her dog.
Lyn Gibson, another resident, said she got to safety by hacking a hole in the roof of her house using a saw, screwdriver, and her feet. As the waters rise there are places where roads are going to be underwater and they may not be marked as such and they are going to be unsafe. Both the woman and dog appeared OK.
Flynn said there are 67 people in the shelter opened in Natchez on Saturday.
Advertisement
Walters said the Red Cross is also looking for volunteers. An additional 20 were to be transferred soon as a precautionary measure.
