Heavy rain to raise flood concerns in southern US early this week
Heavy rains flooded streets in Jackson, Mississippi, on Wednesday, Nov. 7, as a line of storms moved across the southeast. The Jackson Clarion-Ledger also said there were reports of golf ball-sized hail during the storms.
Soaking rain will spread through the southern United States into Tuesday, raising concerns for flooding and travel disruptions.
The wet weather can also disrupt Veterans Day parades, memorial services and other events for the holiday.
A storm whitening the southern Plains with snow will gather moisture as it sweeps along the Gulf Coast states into Tuesday.
“Due to the saturated state of the ground and fallen leaves blocking storm sewers, even a moderate amount of rain can lead to flooding in poor drainage areas and along small streams,” AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alex Sosnowski said.
During the first 10 days of the month, cities from Shreveport and New Orleans, Louisiana, to Jackson and Tupelo, Mississippi; Tuscaloosa, Alabama; Nashville; Atlanta; and Columbia, South Carolina, received 200-350 percent of their normal rainfall for the time frame.
The soaked soil may lead to an excess of runoff into small creeks and streams.
As the storm sweeps into the Northeast on Monday night, trailing rainfall will dampen the Carolinas to the upper Gulf Coast as many head back to work and school on Tuesday.
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“Motorists can expect wet conditions with blowing spray and ponding in poor drainage areas,” Sosnowski said.
This includes along stretches of interstates 10, 20, 40, 55, 59, 75 and 85.
Make sure windshield wipers are in good working order before heading out early this week.
While most of the Southeast will be unseasonably cool amid the cloudy and rainy conditions, enough warm, humid air could be in place along and just inland of the central Gulf Coast for such storms to ignite.
“There is the potential for strong to locally severe thunderstorms,” Sosnowski said.
"A couple of isolated tornadoes may occur with these storms, but the greatest threats will be from straight-line wind gusts," Sosnowski added.
A separate zone of feisty storms may target coastal areas from eastern North Carolina to southeast Virginia during Monday night.
The Southern states may have little, if any, time to dry out before the next storm arrives.
AccuWeather meteorologists are closely monitoring this next storm around the middle to latter part of the week that could not only bring another round of soaking rain to the Southeast, but also threaten the southern Appalachians with ice.
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