River flooding causes major impacts days after severe storms in the central US

AccuWeather

Storm chaser Aaron Rigsby reports live from Ohio on April 8 as extreme flooding continues to cause major problems from Cincinnati to Frankfort and well beyond.

Transcript

00:00Aaron joins us now from Springfield, Ohio, after traveling north from Kentucky, where he was earlier.

00:05Aaron, tell us what you've witnessed the past few days.

00:09Yeah, good morning, guys.

00:10I tell you, the last few days is exactly why I do what I do,

00:13because we have focused so much on the immediate flash flood threat

00:16that I think a lot of folks just kind of think that all of the danger is over.

00:20Meanwhile, folks like that in Kentucky, where they've been suffering for days in and days out

00:26of near or record-breaking river flooding,

00:28that's one of those effects and results from all of that flash flooding

00:32that has caused so many headaches for so many over such a large portion of the U.S.,

00:37and there's been anywhere.

00:38I've seen water as high up to the second floor of rooftops.

00:41There are still to this day right now search and rescue operations ongoing

00:45for some of those locations, including a couple areas in Boston,

00:49and they've been having to go door-to-door to make sure if anybody has been home

00:53that stayed behind that is now trapped by those floodwaters

00:56that aren't going to go away really anytime soon.

00:58And even the pictures that you're showing here all the way up to my original home turf

01:02of Cincinnati, Ohio, the Ohio River there is crested up to 60 feet,

01:07and it's really putting into perspective just how important that flood wall is

01:11that has been getting certainly a workout over the last couple of days.

01:14And, Aaron, you just mentioned it.

01:15Both of us have that in common that we're from Cincinnati,

01:18but in places like Frankfurt, that flooding, it's clear that that is not typical,

01:22that this is in a usual situation.

01:24But explain for people in somewhere like Cincinnati where the flooding seems maybe not as bad.

01:30Some people know the river floods a little bit every year.

01:33Explain why this is so unusual.

01:35This is different.

01:38Yeah, well, I mean, for one, the flooding in Frankfurt has only been seen once before,

01:42and it was in the 1970s, and it's what prompted them to build their current flood wall.

01:47But the folks that are beyond that flood wall and in the lower-lying areas,

01:50they were the ones hit substantially hard.

01:53It crested, I think, just a few inches under that record that was set in the 1970s.

01:58And, folks, you know, along the lines of it's been interesting because all of the water from Cincinnati

02:03and that Ohio River, they all eventually meet into the Mississippi River.

02:07So something that's been actually pretty crazy to witness unfold about this particular system

02:11is that all of this is eventually going to drain down to the Gulf.

02:13And down in Louisiana, some of those areas are expected to hit major flood stage,

02:18and they didn't even receive any of the immediate impacts from this storm system

02:22for a perspective of just how widespread and how high-impacting that this has been.

02:27All right, Aaron, so you've had a couple of days to reflect here on what you've seen.

02:32So once again, just give us the kind of context of this storm in a general sense

02:36because normally whenever you see this type of flooding,

02:38it's from a tropical system that works its way across.

02:42But this has not been tropical at all.

02:44This has just been rounds and rounds of rain.

02:46So give us kind of a context of what you've been seeing.

02:51Well, I tell you for sure that they call this a once-in-generational storm for a reason

02:55because, like you said, typically when you see flooding rains like this,

02:58it's associated with the remnants of a tropical system.

03:01This one, however, was a very rare, basically stationary storm system

03:05that just sat over the same areas for multiple days at a time.

03:08And if it's one thing that we really try and reiterate a lot,

03:12especially when it comes to flooding, is to turn around, don't drown.

03:15It's not worth that extra, you know, your life isn't worth an extra few minutes of inconvenience.

03:21Find other ways around it.

03:22It's time and time again we see it with no matter how many flooding events that I cover,

03:26people trying to drive through those high waters,

03:28and also to really yield those evacuation orders when they are issued.

03:32I saw that in Frankfurt.

03:34People were taking that very seriously, which was a very good sign.

03:37But we need that all across the board, especially with these high-impacting events,

03:40especially if you don't see the immediate impacts right away,

03:43necessarily from the flash flooding,

03:45that eventually leads to the river flooding that could impact you if you leave near a river.

03:50Some good reminders there.

03:51Thanks, Storm Chaser Aaron Brigsby.

03:54Thank you for that report.

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