Historic West Virginia flooding prompts statewide emergency as severe storms sweep East

By Meteorologists Mary Gilbert, Dakota Smith and Briana Waxman

(CNN) — Severe thunderstorms unleashed catastrophic flooding across parts of central West Virginia Tuesday while also spawning tornadoes and damaging winds from Kentucky to New Jersey as they swept through the Ohio Valley and Mid-Atlantic.

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Storms dropped more than 5 inches of rain in about six hours in parts of Upshur County, West Virginia, Tuesday afternoon. The National Weather Service has tagged this as a “particularly dangerous situation,” noting several reports of swift water rescues and significant structure flooding. CNN has reached out to local authorities for more information.

The flooding has reached historic levels. The Sand Run stream gauge near Buckhannon crested above 10.6 feet Tuesday, shattering the previous record of 8.3 feet set during the devastating 1985 flood. It’s the first time in roughly 80 years of recordkeeping that the gauge has reached major flood stage.

In 1985, severe flooding in Upshur County killed 47 people and destroyed thousands of homes and hundreds of businesses.

The flooding prompted Gov. Patrick Morrisey to declare a state of emergency for all 55 counties in West Virginia Tuesday evening, allowing state agencies to coordinate resources and deploy personnel and equipment as needed. The governor said the hardest-hit areas included Lewis, Pleasants and Upshur counties, where flooding and related damage have triggered ongoing emergency response efforts.

The same storm system responsible for the flooding also produced multiple tornadoes and widespread damaging winds farther north and east. Tornadoes were reported in Kentucky, Ohio and New Jersey Tuesday, including one in Clermont County, Ohio.

Denise Davis, who lives in Clermont County, told CNN affiliate WKRC that she brought her grandchildren to the basement as soon as she heard the tornado warning.

“The winds picked up, the lights were flickering and then I heard a real loud bang, which of course was the tree falling onto the house,” she said.

Davis added that everyone was in a safe position under the basement stairs when the tree fell.

“I cried and then the grandbabies were crying,” Davis said, recounting the moment she first saw the tree on her house. “I just don’t know what to do from here.”

Two tornadoes were also observed in northern New Jersey after supercell thunderstorms marched over the area.

As of Tuesday evening, about 110,000 people in the storm-affected areas were without power, according to Poweroutage.us.

Flash flood warnings were issued for New York City Tuesday afternoon, but were lifted later in the evening.

The Big Apple’s sewer infrastructure is old and limited: Built over a century ago, the system is built to handle only about 1.75 inches of rainfall per hour.

In recent years, as more extreme weather events become common occurrences, the system has showed its limits. When the system backs up under pressure of large amounts of rainfall in short periods of time, it results in flooded streets in low lying areas, homes and subway stations.

Severe thunderstorm risk

Flood risk

This story has been updated with additional information.

CNN’s Gloria Pazmino, Julianna Bragg and Danya Gainor contributed to this report.

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