“Our state is now experiencing a historic flooding event that is breaking every record”, Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards said in a statement late on Monday.
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“Well over” 20,000 people have been rescued, Edwards said during a joint news conference with Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Administrator Craig Fugate. His office later increased that figure to more than 30,000.
Flooding began over the weekend, and Edwards said emergency officials remain in search-and-rescue mode.
“We understand that there are a lot of people who are suffering”, Edwards said.
Residents awoke to find their homes and businesses still surrounded by muddy water, and vehicles submerged, without clear answers about when the epic flooding is expected to recede. There were fish and thousands of spiders, and mold had started to grow. Volunteers worked to remove wooden floor boards, sheet rock and insulation before the mold set in.
“The next 24 to 48 hours is going to be a significant indication of just how much risk the parish remains in”, said Rick Webre, director of the Homeland Security Office.
“We’re asking people, if you’re going to fight it, fight it, but I think it was a tough decision to make for everybody”. “Like everybody says, you still have your family”.
David Key looks at the back yard of his flooded home in Prairieville, La., Tuesday, Aug. 16, 2016.
President Barack Obama declared a state of emergency Sunday, freeing up federal funding to supplement state and local recovery efforts.
In nearby Livingston Parish, 76 percent of all homes were already “lost to floods”, Lori Steele, a spokeswoman for the parish, told NBC News. “I am optimistic that more parishes will be approved as we work around the clock to ensure every resource is available to the people of Louisiana”.
“The water was waist deep, so it’s iffy if I can take the sheet rock and insulation half way or have to go to the ceiling”, she said. Officials said he drowned near his home in East Baton Rouge Parish.
“This one is bigger and has impacted more people”, he said.
The slow-moving, low-pressure system crawled into Texas, but the National Weather Service warned the danger of new flooding remained high due to the sheer volume of water flowing toward the Gulf of Mexico.
Louisiana’s confirmed death toll from the latest flooding rose to 11 on Tuesday, the state Health Department said.
A 59-year-old man who died in the same parish appeared to have been swept away by rushing floodwaters.
The storm has dissipated, and in most places the water levels have dropped-nearly nine feet in some. Another, Livingston, got almost 22 inches over the same stretch.
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The Amite River, the source of flooding in many areas, had risen 4.3m above flood level in one reading, besting a previous record flood in April 1983, the NWS said.
