Areal Flood Warning Issued For HoCo, Police Warn Motorists

HOWARD COUNTY, MD — The US National Weather Service Baltimore/Washington has issued an areal flood warning for Howard County until 4 p.m. Tuesday. Doppler radar and automated rain gauges indicate heavy rain falling over the area, which will cause flooding. Up to 2 inches of rain has already fallen in the area with an additional 3 to 5 inches possible.

The Howard County Police Department issued a reminder: turn around, don't drown. It takes only six inches of fast moving flood water to knock over an adult, 12 inches of rushing water to carry away a small car and two feet of rushing water to carry away most vehicles.

Tropical Storm Isaias is expected to hit the mid-Atlantic with tropical storm-force winds and up to 6 inches of rain Tuesday before moving up the East Coast by the evening. A tornado spawned by the storm is believed to have killed one person in North Carolina.

Tropical Storm Isaias was about 80 miles south of Washington, D.C., or 110 miles south of Baltimore at 8:40 a.m. Packing 70 mph winds, the storm was moving north-northeast at 33 mph after making landfall as a Category 1 hurricane near Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina, at 11:10 p.m. Monday.

More than 314,000 North Carolina residents were without power Tuesday morning, and more than 330,000 Virginians were also experiencing outages as Tropical Storm Isaias moved out of northeastern North Carolina and across Virginia.