Excerpt
JEFFREY BROWN (Newshour): The numbers from the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast outlined a growing flood disaster today, up to 10 inches of rain in a matter of hours, and 100,000 people forced to evacuate so far. All of this caused by remnants of Tropical Storm Lee, already blamed for nine deaths since it struck the Gulf Coast last weekend.
By this morning, downpours in northeastern Pennsylvania turned even peaceful waterways into torrents. Loyalsock Creek raged into Montoursville, 30 miles outside Wilkes-Barre, and fast-rising water threatened the region with the kind of flooding not seen since Hurricane Agnes almost four decades ago.
MAN: Well, I lived here all my life, 56 years now, and it's the worst I have ever seen. I went through the '72 flood, and this actually is probably going to end up beating that.
JEFFREY BROWN: In all, 70,000 people along the Susquehanna River and its tributaries in Pennsylvania were told to evacuate by late this afternoon. The orders stretched south to Harrisburg, the state capital, where crews sandbagged the governor's mansion.
Gov. Tom Corbett spoke this afternoon.
GOV. TOM CORBETT, R-Pa.: Some of the flood gauges that we use out there cannot give us reliable data now because they're so far underwater. We face a clear public health emergency, because sewage treatment plants, such as the one near Hershey, are underwater and no longer working.
As you know, floodwater is toxic. It is polluted. And if the sewage treatment plants aren't working, they're going to be polluted. If you don't have to be in the water, stay out of the water.
JEFFREY BROWN: The Susquehanna was headed toward a crest this evening in Wilkes-Barre at 41 feet. Elsewhere in the state, flooding in Dover Township engulfed a mobile home community.
WOMAN: It's a nightmare, and we pray to God that it soon stops and it recedes. I'm hoping a lot of people don't lose a lot of their belongings, but it looks like there's going to be some major water damage.
JEFFREY BROWN: And near Silver Spring, Pa., the Conodoguinet Creek was flowing out of its banks, leaving nervous homeowners to decide whether to go or stay.
JAMI ALLEN, flood victim: I have never had it, this much fear, going into this as I do right now of what the potential damage could be. And it's scary. It really is.
JEFFREY BROWN: To the north, some 20,000 people had already been evacuated Wednesday around Binghamton, N.Y., and neighboring communities.
There, the Susquehanna broke records and kept rising, and some people resorted to airboats to get around. Across the city, it was hard to tell where roads used to be or to find this school's football field. Only the scoreboard and goalposts still rose above the huge pool of water. Shopping centers, cars, homes were all submerged.
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