Authorities are searching for four people, including an infant, after flash floods in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, killed three people on Saturday.
A barrage of rain late Saturday flooded Washington Crossing in the afternoon where 11 vehicles were trapped, Upper Makefield Fire Chief Tim Brewer said Sunday. A total of 6 to 7 inches of rain hit the area, which sits alongside the Delaware River, in less than an hour.
A total of 10 people were rescued from their cars and the creek but three adults died in the flooding, Brewer said. Four more people, including a 9-month-old and a 63-year-old are unaccounted for.
“We have assets in the field, search and rescue are physically walking the creek banks and in the creek where accessible,” Brewer said. “This is a very inaccessible area of the township. It is steep cliffs on both sides.”
He said his teams were treating their operations as a rescue mission but are “fairly certain” it is now a recovery situation. Brewer declined to identify those caught in the flood out of respect for their families.
In his 44 years of service, Brewer said he’s never seen anything like this before. He estimated that 5 feet of water rushed the road in a violent manner very suddenly.
“I thought Hurricane Ida was the benchmark. … I thought that was the benchmark,” Brewer said. “This is the new benchmark.”
Read the full article here
