(NEW YORK) — Amid floodwaters already up to the roofs of some homes and turning the streets of multiple cities into rushing rivers, Midwest residents are bracing for more severe storms on Thursday.
“When I looked out my window, I saw my fence floating past my window,” Karlie Frey, a resident of hard-hit Cambridge City, Indiana, told ABC Indianapolis affiliate station WRTV.
After being evacuated from her home on Wednesday via a rescue boat, Frey, who has lived in Cambridge City since 2009, said, “I’ve never seen it get this bad.”
Indiana, which recorded three storm-related deaths this week, was in the path of more severe storms expected to pound the Midwest on Thursday.
Indiana Gov. Mike Braun declared a statewide disaster emergency on Thursday.
“Hoosiers’ safety is my top priority. Our state response is fully mobilized, resources are moving where they’re needed, and we will continue working around the clock to support every impacted community,” Braun said in a social media post on Thursday.
Braun is expected to meet with first responders in Cambridge City and survey the damage there to “ensure state resources are available to support the response and recovery efforts,” the governor’s office said in a statement.
Meanwhile, rescue operations resumed on Thursday for one person in Delaware County, Indiana, who was among four people who reportedly went into the Mississinewa River on Wednesday during significant flooding, authorities said. Three others were rescued from the river on Wednesday night, officials noted.
Flood watches also remained in effect in Iowa, Kentucky and North Carolina, where showers and storms are possible on Thursday, keeping the threat of more flooding in place.
Like in recent days, storms expected from Des Moines, Iowa, to Lexington, Kentucky, and Knoxville, Tennessee, have the potential to train, or remain stationary, over the same areas, and could produce rainfall rates of 1 to 2 inches per hour.
The National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center said severe isolated storms on Thursday are expected to occur across Iowa and Illinois, including the cities of Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, Springfield and Peoria.
The storms are expected to be accompanied by damaging winds, large hail and possible tornadoes.
Dangerous heat will also be a factor from the Midwest and Plains to the Southeast, all the way down to South Florida. More than 100 million people in over 15 states are under heat alerts on Thursday as a heat dome remains parked over the country’s Mid-South region.
Extreme heat warnings are in effect for Wichita, Kansas City, St. Louis and Paducah, Kentucky. Heat indices, which include humidity, will make it feel 111 in St. Louis and 110 in Kansas City.
Meanwhile, authorities are continuing to assess the damage from storms, floods, and at least five tornadoes, including three in southwest Chicago suburbs, that devastated the Midwest over the past two days.
Images from flooded areas of Cambridge City and elsewhere in Henry County showed floodwaters up to the roofs of some homes and many flooded streets impassable.
In an interview with ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Cambridge City Town Council President Jim McLane described the flood in his small town of 1,700 people as “pretty devastating.”
McLane said he has lived in the area for 60 years and had never seen flooding “anything remotely compared to this.” He said flood waters rose “several feet higher than most people have seen it here before.”
McLane described a seven-to-eight-block area of flooded homes in Cambridge City, and said dozens of people had to be rescued by boat.
Henry County Sheriff John Sproles said more than 50 people were rescued on Wednesday from a flooded apartment complex in Henry County.
Henry County officials are also investigating a possible tornado that moved through New Castle, Indiana, on Wednesday, toppling trees and ripping the roof off a commercial building.
Sproles said he is concerned about additional rainfall hitting the area.
“Any more rain is really going to put us into much more significant problems,” he said.
Eric Stiles, who owns a plumbing company in Indiana, posted a video this week of damage caused by severe storms that hit Munster, Indiana, on Tuesday. The footage showed a line of massive trees uprooted in one residential neighborhood.
“It’s like driving through a war zone,” Stiles said in the video.
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