Joplin, Mo., continues to dig out from the massive tornado that blasted the city Sunday, but it wasn't the only city hit hard that day. Minneapolis-based Finance and Commerce reports that officials there are dealing with a "very preliminary" estimate of $166 million in damage to homes, buildings and infrastructure.
Earth Changes
Heavy rains have caused major flooding in many locations across Northeast Oklahoma.
Nearly ten inches of rain have fallen near Vinita. That's where SkyNews6 found three men rescuing a woman in a stranded vehicle. The video shows one man breaking a window to help get the woman out. The men then helped her wade through the water to safety.
News On 6 reporter Ashli Sims captured video of flooding along I-44 southwest of Miami. Flooding forced Miami Public Schools to cancel classes Tuesday.
Rising waters also caused problems in Muskogee. The Muskogee Police Department told News On 6 officers performed several vehicle rescues Monday evening.
Cherokee County Emergency Management said it had also received reports of significant flooding. Officials there said at least three water rescues were performed Monday, but no one was injured. Power lines and trees are down across Cherokee County.
© Graphics from http://www.pagasa.dost.gov.ph
PAGASA-DOST MTSAT-EIR Satellite Image for 5 a.m., 25 May 2011
PAGASA-DOST MTSAT-EIR Satellite Image for 5 a.m., 25 May 2011
As of 10 a.m. Tuesday, the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) said, Chedeng was located 490 kilometers east of Borongan, Eastern Samar, with maximum sustained winds of 105 kilometers per hour near the center and gusting up to 135 kph.
Already Tuesday morning, 1.25 inches of rain had fallen in Red Cloud near the Kansas border. And overnight rains added as much as 2 inches of rain to already soggy soil in southwest and west-central Nebraska.
Rain totals included: Imperial, 2.04 inches; Wauneta, 1.94; Wellfleet, 1.17; Hayes Center, 1.09; Curtis, 0.97; Moorefield, 0.92; Swan Lake, 0.75; Oshkosh, 0.73; North Platte, 0.71.
The North Platte area is under a flood warning and flash flood watch, bracing for 2-4 more inches of rain. The North Platte River is already at a record level, with overflows expected to increase at least through Friday.
A rogue jet stream is responsible for causing severe weather since the fall - including Sunday's devastating tornado in Joplin, Mo. - and could trigger severe flooding in the West, a JPL climatologist warned Monday.
Bill Patzert of the NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Ca ada Flintridge said he is "extremely anxious" about the possibility of floods that could arrive in late spring and early summer in the West.
"Especially on the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers" and the upper Colorado River, he said.
Bill Patzert of the NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Ca ada Flintridge said he is "extremely anxious" about the possibility of floods that could arrive in late spring and early summer in the West.
"Especially on the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers" and the upper Colorado River, he said.
© Reuters
So far the fires are confined to eastern Russia
So far the fires are confined to eastern Russia
The fires were mainly confined to remote parts of Siberia and the Urals, with no blazes reported near Moscow and other central Russian cities.
But the area on fire is twice the size of that for the same period last year.
Drought, fires and smog left dozens dead and ruined crops in 2010, and there are fears of a repeat disaster.
The emergencies ministry said in a report on its website that the biggest fires were in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia), the Amur region and the Krasnoyarsk territory.
More than 6,000 personnel equipped with more than 1,140 units of fire-fighting equipment were deployed against the fires, backed by 42 aircraft.
Of the 421 fires reported on Monday, 241 were extinguished, the ministry said.
Western Russia, the centre of the country's grain production, remains largely unaffected by fire, but officials say the situation may deteriorate if dry weather persists.
Russia's official forecast for this year's wheat crop is 85-90m tonnes compared to some 61m in 2010, 97m in 2009 and 108m in 2008.
Meanwhile, drought conditions have been hitting grain crops in northern Europe, with some forecasters predicting above-average temperatures for the summer months.
A mudslide has closed a road in Maple Grove in the northwestern Twin Cities.
Hennepin County officials say an emergency closure is in place on Bottineau Boulevard from 93rd Avenue North to Fernbrook Lane.
Heavy rains and storms over the weekend caused the mudslide.
Crews are working to remove the mudslide so one lane in each direction will be open by Monday evening. Residents are encouraged to find alternate routes.
Hennepin County officials say an emergency closure is in place on Bottineau Boulevard from 93rd Avenue North to Fernbrook Lane.
Heavy rains and storms over the weekend caused the mudslide.
Crews are working to remove the mudslide so one lane in each direction will be open by Monday evening. Residents are encouraged to find alternate routes.
Officials are keeping a close eye on both the rivers and the sky this week, as they track several weather systems predicted to bring rain and more flood worries to western Montana.
The National Weather Service issued flood watches for Missoula and Ravalli counties Monday afternoon in anticipation of overnight rainshowers.
Severe flooding in eastern Montana caused road closures and evacuations as the week began, prompting Gov. Brian Schweitzer to issue a statewide flood emergency declaration. Missoula, Ravalli, Sanders, Lincoln, Glacier and Lake counties were all included in the declaration.
The Weather Service issued a flood warning for the Clark Fork River above Missoula as well. The river rose to 9.3 feet Monday and is forecast to reach its 10-foot flood stage by Tuesday morning.
"The area that looks like it will go to flood probably quicker than anything is the Clark Fork River in Missoula. How fast and how much it rises will depend on how much precipitation falls. This forecast could change as we go into the week," said Ray Nickless, hydrologist for the Weather Service.
The National Weather Service issued flood watches for Missoula and Ravalli counties Monday afternoon in anticipation of overnight rainshowers.
Severe flooding in eastern Montana caused road closures and evacuations as the week began, prompting Gov. Brian Schweitzer to issue a statewide flood emergency declaration. Missoula, Ravalli, Sanders, Lincoln, Glacier and Lake counties were all included in the declaration.
The Weather Service issued a flood warning for the Clark Fork River above Missoula as well. The river rose to 9.3 feet Monday and is forecast to reach its 10-foot flood stage by Tuesday morning.
"The area that looks like it will go to flood probably quicker than anything is the Clark Fork River in Missoula. How fast and how much it rises will depend on how much precipitation falls. This forecast could change as we go into the week," said Ray Nickless, hydrologist for the Weather Service.
© Reuters, The Starphoenix
Sandbags surround farm buildings as water from a deliberate breach of a dike on the Assiniboine River approaches near Newton, Man. Swollen with water from the Portage Diversion and driven by a gale, Lake Manitoba reared up on Monday and slammed against the shores in cabin country.
Sandbags surround farm buildings as water from a deliberate breach of a dike on the Assiniboine River approaches near Newton, Man. Swollen with water from the Portage Diversion and driven by a gale, Lake Manitoba reared up on Monday and slammed against the shores in cabin country.
Thirty homes in Delta Beach were placed under voluntary evacuation, hours after a blustery north wind sent water crashing against homes, surging over some of the community's roads and swamping three cabins on its southern edge.
The Rural Municipality of Portage la Prairie was monitoring the situation "hour by hour," an official on the scene said, in case a mandatory evacuation order was needed.
But while some cottagers and full-time residents were spotted driving away, cars packed with clothes, other residents along a mucky stretch road stayed, betting that the roads out would stay passable.
With most sandbags in place, all they could do was watch the waves break and wonder what might happen next to the lake that is, suddenly, a threat.
© Mike Gullett/AP Photo
Mary Womack, right, reacts to the news that a renter who lived in her house had been found and taken to the hospital, May 23, 2011.
Mary Womack, right, reacts to the news that a renter who lived in her house had been found and taken to the hospital, May 23, 2011.
"It was just one big wall," he said of the nearly mile-wide tornado. "You couldn't see a funnel. It was just so massive."
His story of survival is just one of many beginning to emerge after the twister cut a six-mile-wide path through Joplin on Sunday, causing widespread destruction and killing 117 people -- the most from one storm in 60 years.
