Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 18, 1990 TAG: 9003182336
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Also in Alabama, six people drowned when their car ran off a back road into a rain-swollen creek where a bridge had washed out.
Elsewhere across the South, most of western Georgia was under flood warnings Saturday although rain had tapered off. In Mississippi, about 35 homes were flooded in Jackson County and several roads were washed out after 14 inches of rain in two days.
No injuries were immediately reported in Elba, a town of 4,400 about 70 miles southeast of Montgomery, where the earthen levee on the Pea River gave way about 6:30 a.m. Rescuers in boats plucked residents from rooftops and trees as the waters rose, said Sheriff Brice Paul.
Military helicopters picked up at least four people, said Bill Hayes, an Army spokesman at nearby Fort Rucker. He said the choppers were still responding to calls.
Witnesses said water was up to second-story windows of the Coffee County Courthouse, higher than it reached in a record 1929 flood.
Mark Oberfield, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Birmingham, said rain had been heavy throughout southeast Alabama, including 16.8 inches in Troy and 16.3 inches in Andalusia over the past 48 hours.
While the sun peeked out Saturday, forecasters said rivers would continue rising.
Elba Mayor Fred Morris said at least 1,000 people had been forced to leave their homes.
Most roads were flooded and telephone lines were down, and officials were trying to set up emergency communications. The Red Cross was sending rescue workers from as far as Birmingham, 160 miles away.
About 50 miles southwest of Elba, downtown Brewton was under 6 feet of water from the Murder and Burnt Corn creeks.
Also south of Elba, near the Florida border, six people died when their car ran off a county road into a roaring creek late Friday. Coroner Norman Hobson said the driver apparently did not realize the bridge was gone.
In Georgia, Peachtree Creek in Atlanta flooded. The entire Chattahoochee River was under a flood warning, from Atlanta in northern Georgia to Lake Seminole in the southwest corner of the state.
Rain that had pounded southeastern Mississippi for two days stopped Saturday after flooding about 35 homes in Jackson County.
"Before the weekend goes, we could see at least another 30 [homes] with water in them," said Hank Turk, Jackson County public safety director. Road crews were working to put down sandbags as the Pascagoula and Escatawpa rivers rise.
In southeast Tennessee, nearly a foot of water was reported Saturday in the streets of Copperhill and Ducktown in Polk County, but it was receding by afternoon. An undetermined number of people had voluntarily left their homes, but there was no ordered evacuation, said David King, emergency operations officer from the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency in Nashville.
by CNB