Tag Archives: Louisiana

Two people killed in Louisiana mobile home hit by tornado

A trailer home where two people were killed after a possible tornado, is damaged in Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, U.S.,

By Letitia Stein and Steve Gorman

(Reuters) – A tornado flipped over a mobile home in south-central Louisiana on Sunday, killing a toddler and her mother, as forecasters warned of a dangerous weather system bringing twisters, fierce straight-line winds and hail to the Gulf Coast region.

Neville Alexander, 3, and Francine Gotch, 38, were inside the mobile home in the town of Breaux Bridge, just outside Lafayette, Louisiana, when the storm slammed into the dwelling, causing “significant damage,” the St. Martin Sheriff’s Office said on its Facebook page.

Video posted on the page showed the remnants of a mobile home with its walls and roof collapsed and furniture and other household belongings upended and scattered. Nearby houses and vehicles appeared unscathed.

The National Weather Service (NWS) later confirmed the demolished trailer was upended by a tornado packing winds of around 100 miles per hour (161 kph) and ranked as a category EF-1 on the five-point Enhanced Fujita Scale. An EF-5 is the highest rating.

Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards said the Weather Service had issued a “high risk” advisory for central and northern Louisiana, warning residents to be vigilant of the threat of severe weather.

Other parts of Louisiana were under “moderate and enhanced” alerts for severe weather, he said, adding, “This is a statewide weather event.”

In addition to tornado threats, thunderstorms were bringing hurricane-force, straight-line winds and large hail to the region, the governor said.

Television station WAFB-TV in Baton Rouge, the state capital, reported more than 4,500 lightning strikes across the state by late afternoon.

Edwards called for members of the public to remain indoors and avoid unnecessary travel, while urging mobile homes residents to stay with friends or relatives in more solid structures overnight if possible.

The NWS posted tornado watches for a portion of eastern Texas and most of the two neighboring Gulf states of Louisiana and Mississippi. A flash-flood warning was in effect for a large swath of east Texas and Louisiana.

Tornado sightings were reported in central Texas and north-central Louisiana, while high winds were snapping trees and causing other damage, the NWS reported.

The brunt of the storm system, also a concern for southern Arkansas, was expected to track eastward into Mississippi after dark, and possibly into Alabama on Monday morning.

The warnings come after severe weather killed at least 21 people in the South earlier this year, many in mobile homes demolished by tornadoes in Georgia and Mississippi.

(Reporting by Letitia Stein in Tampa, Florida, and Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Additional reporting by McGurty in New York; Editing by Phil Berlowitz and Sandra Maler)

Thirty-one reported injured after tornadoes pummel Louisiana

Cleanup crews pick up New Orleans area after tornado

By Bryn Stole

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) – Some 31 people were reported injured after six tornadoes tore through New Orleans and other parts of Louisiana, pounding across highways and streets and leaving trees, power lines and homes leveled by Wednesday morning.

Federal and state damage assessment teams on Wednesday began working to see if Louisiana can qualify for federal assistance, Mike Steele, communications director for the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, said.

Governor John Bel Edwards declared a state of emergency throughout Louisiana, as search and rescue teams scoured the landscape for survivors from Tuesday’s tornadoes.

“The width of the devastation was unlike any that I have seen before,” Edwards told a news conference on Tuesday. “When you see it from the air you’re even more impressed that so few people were injured and that nobody’s life was lost.”

The storm system battered New Orleans and suburban Baton Rouge, marking the fourth time in a year the state has been jolted by natural disasters.

A string of tornadoes struck in February 2016 and four people died in widespread floods in March. Louisiana was then devastated by major flooding in August, when more than 60,000 homes were damaged or destroyed in 20 parishes, or territorial districts, marking the state’s worst disaster since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

One twister carved out a swath of destruction about two miles (3 km) long and about half a mile (1 km) wide, affecting an area with 5,000 properties, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said.

“It’s devastating and a lot of families have lost everything that they have,” Landrieu said.

Thirty-one injuries have been reported, according to the mayor’s office. Six of them were moderate or severe injuries, and there have been no reported fatalities, the office said in a statement.

At least 8,100 customers were without power in the New Orleans area by early Wednesday, according to Entergy New Orleans Inc <EYNOO.PK>. About 150 workers from the energy company assisted in recovery efforts on Wednesday.

Nancy Malone, communications director for the Red Cross of Louisiana, said damage was reported in about six parishes, where the Red Cross was assisting first responders.

“While this was not expected, communities in southeast Louisiana have been affected numerous times in the last 12 months,” Malone said. “Here we are again.”

(Additional reporting by Gina Cherelus, Mike Cooper and Irene Klotz; Writing by Daniel Trotta; Editing by Alistair Bell)

Tornadoes tear path of destruction through Louisiana, at least 20 hurt

By Bryn Stole

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) – Six tornadoes tore through New Orleans and other parts of Louisiana on Tuesday, injuring at least 20 people as the storm roared across highways and streets, leveling trees, power lines and homes.

Governor John Bel Edwards declared a state of emergency throughout Louisiana, while search and rescue teams scoured the landscape for survivors.

“The width of the devastation was unlike any that I have seen before,” Edwards told a news conference. “When you see it from the air you’re even more impressed that so few people were injured and that nobody’s life was lost.”

The Louisiana National Guard said it was conducting search-and-rescue operations, looking for injured people who may be stranded, and assessing damage.

The storm system battered New Orleans and suburban Baton Rouge, marking the fourth time in a year the state has been jolted by natural disasters.

A string of tornadoes struck in February 2016 and four people died in widespread floods in March. Louisiana was then devastated by major flooding in August, when more than 60,000 homes were damaged or destroyed in 20 parishes, or territorial districts, marking the state’s worst disaster since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu told reporters that one twister carved out a swath of destruction about two miles (3 km) long and about half a mile (1 km) wide, affecting an area that holds 5,000 properties.

“It’s devastating and a lot of families have lost everything that they have,” Landrieu said.

Edwards estimated the number of injured at 20, some of them he termed “not life-threatening, but very serious.”

Storm reports on the National Weather Service website said some 29 people suffered injuries.

One person was injured and about 200 cars damaged at a National Aeronautics and Space Administration assembly building in New Orleans, but flight hardware for NASA’s new heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket and Orion capsule appear to have escaped damage, associate administrator Bill Gerstenmaier said.

Nearly 7,800 customers were without power in the New Orleans area by early Wednesday, according to Entergy New Orleans Inc <EYNOO.PK>.

Nancy Malone, communications director for the Red Cross of Louisiana, said damage was reported in about six parishes, where the Red Cross was assisting first responders.

“While this was not expected, communities in southeast Louisiana have been affected numerous times in the last 12 months,” Malone said. “Here we are again.”

(Additional reporting by Gina Cherelus, Mike Cooper and Irene Klotz; Writing by Daniel Trotta; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and David Gregorio)

Louisiana man pleads guilty to threatening shooting at D.C. pizzeria

view of pizzeria where man threatened to shoot

(Reuters) – A Louisiana man pleaded guilty on Thursday to a federal charge that he threatened to carry out a shooting at a Washington D.C. pizzeria near another restaurant where days earlier a man opened fire as he investigated a fake news report, a prosecutor said.

Yusif Jones, 52, faces five years in prison after he pleaded guilty to one count of interstate threatening communications in Louisiana federal court when he will be sentenced on April 12, the office of United States Attorney Stephanie Finley said in a statement.

Jones also faces three years of supervised release and restitution and a $250,000 fine, the statement said.

Jones was accused of calling Besta Pizza on Dec. 7 and threatened to “shoot everyone in the place” in order to “save the kids.” The call was traced back to Jones in Shreveport and he was arrested, the statement said.

The call was placed three days after Edgar Maddison Welch took a rifle into Comet Ping Pong restaurant down the street from Besta Pizza “to self-investigate” a fake news report known as “Pizza Gate” that it was operating a child abuse ring, police said.

The suspect entered the restaurant and pointed a gun at a restaurant employee, who fled and notified authorities, police said. The man then discharged the weapon inside the restaurant. There were no injuries.

In November, media outlets reported about death threats against the owner of the restaurant after internet postings said the restaurant was operating a child abuse ring led by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and her top campaign aide.

Police said there was no active investigation of child abuse allegations there. The attack on Comet was considered an example of how fake news reports that proliferated during the election year affected people’s lives.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Toby Chopra)

U.S. law enforcement line-of-duty deaths hit five-year high in 2016

A Dallas police sergeant wears a mourning band and flower on his badge during a prayer vigil, one day after a lone gunman ambushed and killed five police officers at a protest decrying police shootings of black men, in Dallas, Texas, U.S.,

By Jon Herskovitz

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – Law enforcement fatalities hit a five-year high in 2016 with 135 officers killed in the line of duty, including eight killed in ambush attacks in Dallas and Louisiana in July that raised nationwide concerns, a study released on Thursday said.

So far this year, 21 officers were killed in ambush-style attacks, the highest figure in two decades, according to the study from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, which tracks data on the incidents.

This included five police officers gunned down in Dallas in July by a deranged U.S. Army Reserve veteran, 25-year-old Micah X. Johnson, who said he aimed to avenge the shootings of black men by police nationwide.

A woman lights a candle at a makeshift memorial at Dallas Police Headquarters,

File Photo: A woman lights a candle at a makeshift memorial at Dallas Police Headquarters, one day after a lone gunman ambushed and killed five police officers at a protest decrying police shootings of black men, in Dallas, Texas, U.S., July 8, 2016. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton/File Photo

“Public safety is a partnership and, too often, the service and sacrifice of our law enforcement professionals is taken for granted,” said Craig Floyd, president of the fund.

Firearms-related incidents were the number one cause of death, with 64 officers fatally shot, the survey said. Traffic-related incidents accounted for 53 deaths.

Among the officers killed were local and state police officers, federal border agents and corrections officers. The study did not break out the number of police officers killed.

The average age of the officers who died on duty this year was 40 and the average length of service was 13 years. Texas had the most fatalities, at 17, followed by California with 10 and Louisiana with 9, including three who were killed in July in Baton Rouge, the survey said.

A black Iraq war veteran fatally shot the three police officers and wounded three others in Baton Rouge in an ambush.

The Dallas and Baton Rouge attacks, less than two weeks apart, followed fatal shootings by police officers of black men in Minnesota and Louisiana.

There were protests nationwide this year over the killings by police of unarmed black men, incidents that raised questions of racial bias in U.S. policing.

The number of officers who died in the line of duty in 2016 was up 10 percent from the previous year of 123, the survey said.

“As we begin the new year, let us all resolve to respect, honor, and remember those who have served us so well and sacrificed so much in the name of public safety,” Floyd said.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Thousands still in shelters after record Louisiana floods

Louisiana Floods

By Sam Karlin

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) – More than 3,000 Louisiana residents were still in emergency shelters as record flood waters receded on Monday, while government officials weighed options for temporary housing after the state’s worst disaster since Hurricane Katrina.

About 60,600 homes have been reported damaged or destroyed in flooding that swept through 20 parishes, or counties, in the southern part of the state after torrential rains earlier this month.

With swollen rivers, streams and bayous returning to normal, many people were going back to their homes and businesses, and state offices had reopened.

But the governor’s office said 3,075 residents were still living in shelters as of Monday, a day before President Barack Obama is due to tour the stricken area.

The extent of the damage prompted the Federal Emergency Management Agency to extend a grace period to renew lapsed flood insurance policies for parts of Louisiana for the first time since Katrina in 2005.

“We’ve seen major destruction to communities across the state,” Roy Wright, deputy associate administrator for FEMA’s Federal Insurance and Mitigation Administration, said in a statement about the extension.

Residents have already filed more than 25,600 flood insurance claims. But only 42 percent of Louisiana homes in high-risk areas had flood insurance, while only 12.5 percent of homeowners in low and moderate-risk zones were covered, according to FEMA estimates.

The agency has also already received some 110,500 applications for individual assistance, and $74 million in individual grants has been paid out.

“When it comes to a home that is lost, FEMA money is not designed to replace insurance or make people whole again,” said FEMA spokesman Rafael Lemaitre. “It’s a life vest, not a life boat.”

So far, the number of people affected by the floods pales in comparison with the nearly 74,000 families forced out of homes after Katrina and the 11,000 displaced after Hurricane Rita, a storm that came a few weeks later in 2005.

In 2005, FEMA faced widespread criticism for what many considered a slow, inept response. But the agency appears to have benefited from experience.

“From the vantage point of a citizen, what we see is a much more coordinated state, federal and local partnership on the response,” said Adam Knapp, head of the Baton Rouge Area Chamber and a former deputy director of the Louisiana Recovery Authority after Katrina.

“That is a perhaps a hard-fought, hard-won experience for us since Katrina – when we learned how important it is to be coordinated in the immediate response.”

FEMA has formed a task force to identify temporary housing options for the thousands displaced by the floods, Lemaitre said. That may include manufactured housing units that meet or exceed government certifications, he said.

FEMA paid $6.6 billion to about 1.07 million households and individuals in the Gulf states after Katrina, $5.3 billion of which went to Louisiana alone.

In response to this month’s flooding, FEMA has issued more than $15 million in advanced flood insurance payments to Louisianans who sustained damages, the agency said in a statement on Monday.

(Additional reporting and writing by Chris Prentice in New York; editing by Frank McGurty and Tom Brown)

Louisiana residents without flood insurance face uncertainty

Paul Labatut carries damaged furniture through flood water outside her home in St. Amant, Louisiana, U.S

By Sam Karlin

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) – Quenton Robins watched on Sunday morning as a giant metal claw clamped down on his mother’s ruined belongings, snapping wooden cabinets with an audible crack as the operator of a giant mechanized arm slowly cleared a mound of debris from her yard in Baton Rouge.

Five feet (1.5 meters) of water swept through the homes in the quiet Park Forest neighborhood just over a week ago, shocking residents who had been told they did not live in a flood zone.

“It’s not a flood zone,” said Robins, a 27-year-old Navy veteran. “At least it didn’t used to be.”

As efforts in Louisiana turn from rescue to recovery, renters and homeowners who do not have flood insurance are facing an uncertain financial future.

Private insurers do not cover flood damage and flood insurance in the United States is underwritten by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Homeowners who live in designated high-risk flood zones are required to carry flood insurance if they have a federally backed mortgage.

In Louisiana, an estimated 42 percent of homes in high-risk areas have flood insurance, according to FEMA. Only 12.5 percent of homeowners in low and moderate-risk zones do.

Many of the areas hit hard by record rainfall last week were not considered at high risk for flooding.

Those residents without flood insurance are eligible for up to $33,000 in FEMA individual disaster assistance funds, although most will likely receive less than that, based on payments following other major disasters.

After Hurricane Katrina in 2005, FEMA paid $6.6 billion to approximately 1.07 million households and individuals in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, an average of just over $6,000 per grant, according to agency figures. Superstorm Sandy in 2012 produced an average payout of under $8,000 for about 180,000 residents of New York and New Jersey.

FEMA spokesman Rafael Lemaitre said the individual assistance is intended to supplement insurance and to provide short-term relief for immediate needs.

“It’s not designed to make survivors whole again,” said Lemaitre, adding that FEMA recommends all homeowners obtain flood insurance regardless of the risk in their area. He also said residents could apply for low-cost loans from the Small Business Administration.

FEMA has approved more than $55 million in aid so far and some 106,000 Louisiana residents have registered for emergency assistance after the record floods, which killed at least 13 and damaged more than 60,000 homes.

U.S. President Barack Obama plans to visit Baton Rouge on Tuesday.

Down the street from Robins’ mother, retired widow Betty Bailey sat in the shade of her carport, waiting for her damaged possessions to be taken away.

Bailey, who did not have flood insurance, said she moved to the neighborhood in part because it is not in a flood zone. When she applied for FEMA aid, she said they recommended she look into loans to cover her losses.

“How do they know I can afford a loan with all the bills I already have?” Bailey said. “That’s not right.”

Looking out at her neighborhood, Bailey added, “Some of these houses will never be built back.”

(Additional reporting and writing by Joseph Ax; Editing by Bill Trott)

Louisiana assesses flood damage as residents return to soaked homes

Flooding in Louisiana clean up

By Sam Karlin

GONZALES, La. (Reuters) – Ron Allen set out electric fans at his rental property in southeastern Louisiana on Wednesday, hoping to dry floors that had been swamped by nearly a foot of water.

“We’ve got to pull out the wood, pull out the vinyl. But first we gotta get the water out,” said Allen, 66. “This has never happened before.”

Record floods have been blamed for at least 13 deaths and damage to about 40,000 homes. Authorities have only begun assessing the devastation.

Rains that started last Thursday have dumped more than 2-1/2 feet (0.76 meters) of water on parts of Louisiana.

The American Red Cross has called the flooding the worst disaster in the United States since Super Storm Sandy hit the U.S. East Coast in 2012.

“Thousands of people in Louisiana have lost everything they own and need our help now,” Brad Kieserman, vice president of disaster services operations and logistics for the Red Cross, said in a statement.

As of Wednesday afternoon, shelters across the state were housing 5,435 people, according to the Louisiana Department of Children and Family Services.

U.S. President Barack Obama signed a Louisiana disaster declaration on Sunday and ordered federal aid to supplement state and local efforts.

The White House said on Wednesday that Obama had directed the Federal Emergency Management Agency to “utilize all resources available” in responding to the flooding.

Swollen creeks and bayous were still overflowing on Wednesday in downstream communities such as Gonzales, as recovery efforts were beginning around Baton Rouge.

In Livingston Parish, east of Baton Rouge, at least 75 percent of homes were flooded, the sheriff’s office said on Facebook. The parish includes Denham Springs, where about 90 percent of the homes and every local school took in water, Mayor Gerard Landry told local radio station Talk 107.3.

Landry said he thought it could take two to three months to reopen schools.

“These folks that have flooded, they don’t have shoes. They don’t have underwear. They don’t have shirts. They don’t have toilet paper,” he said in the radio interview on Wednesday. “All the basic essential needs, they don’t have.”

For Terry Lyon, 56, the devastation was all too familiar. His trailer was destroyed 11 years ago in Hurricane Katrina, which struck the U.S Gulf Coast and left more than 1,800 people dead.

Lyon’s apartment in Baton Rouge flooded on Saturday, and he and his wife drove to stay with relatives on dry ground in Ascension Parish. By Monday evening, many there were underwater.

“I’ve never seen water come up like this and come after us,” said Lyon, standing outside a shelter in Gonzales, Louisiana. “I never dreamed it could get this bad.”

(Reporting by Sam Karlin; Additional reporting by Bryn Stole in Baton Rouge, La.; Writing by Letitia Stein; Editing by Tom Brown, Toni Reinhold)

Eleven dead, thousands of homes ravaged in Louisiana floods

Residents use a boat to navigate through the floods in Louisiana

By Sam Karlin

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) – Search-and-rescue operations were still underway on Tuesday in Louisiana, where at least 11 people have died in severe floods that damaged about 40,000 homes, state officials said.

Emergency crews had already plucked more than 20,000 people and 1,000 pets from flooded areas after a storm that broke records for 24-hour rainfall in multiple locations, Governor John Bel Edwards told reporters.

Rain-swollen rivers are receding in much of the state, but state officials warned of remaining dangers. Some communities in southern Louisiana could see waters crest later in the week, according to national forecasters.

More than 8,000 people slept in emergency shelters on Monday night, unable to return to their homes, Edwards told a news conference. The state planned to impose curfews on Tuesday night in the parishes with widespread damage.

“This is a historic flooding event,” Edwards said. “It’s unprecedented.”

The storm dumped more than 2-1/2 feet (76 cm) of rain near Watson, Louisiana, from Thursday to Monday morning, the highest total reported, according to the National Weather Service.

In Abbeville, Louisiana, a 125-year-old record for 24-hour rainfall was shattered with 16.38 inches (41.61 cm) reported from Friday to Saturday, the weather service reported.

In some water-ravaged areas, houses flooded to rooflines, and coffins floated away. Motorists were trapped on highways. U.S. President Barack Obama issued a disaster declaration on Sunday, with a total of 20 parishes approved by Tuesday for federal assistance.

Already, 40,000 residents have registered for disaster aid, Edwards said.

In hard-hit Denham Springs, residents were gutting waterlogged homes, dumping soaked carpets and mattresses.

Sonya Mayeux was still in disbelief. On Saturday, she awoke at 9 a.m. to rising, knee-deep water in her backyard. By 11:30 a.m., the water was nearly above her white SUV.

A neighbor rescued her family by boat. Ultimately, her house flooded nearly to the roof.

“The water just came up so fast,” she said.

“VERY LARGE DISASTER”

Craig Fugate, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told reporters the “very large disaster” was affecting more people than flooding in March that left at least four dead and thousands of homes damaged in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Louisiana will mark the 11th anniversary this month of Hurricane Katrina, which killed more than 1,800 people when floods overwhelmed levees and broke through flood walls protecting New Orleans on Aug. 29, 2005.

Louisiana’s confirmed death toll from the latest flooding rose to 11 on Tuesday, the state Health Department said. By parish, it reported five fatalities in East Baton Rouge, three in Tangipahoa, two in St. Helena, and one in Rapides.

Among those killed was Bill Borne, the founder and former chief executive of Amedisys Inc, a provider of home health and hospice care. Officials said he drowned near his home in East Baton Rouge Parish.

(Additional reporting by Ian Simpson in Washington, Colleen Jenkins in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and Bryn Stole in Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Writing by Letitia Stein in Tampa, Florida; Editing by Tom Brown)

Flooding disaster that killed seven in Louisiana now menaces Texas

Richard Rossi and his 4 year old great grandson Justice wade through water in search of higher ground after their home took in water in St. Amant, Louisiana,

By Bryn Stole

LIVINGSTON, La. (Reuters) – Overwhelmed rivers in much of southern Louisiana receded slowly from record levels on Monday while crews in boats searched for more people stranded in inundated homes after three days of torrential rains that killed seven people.

While the threat of flash flooding moved west into Texas, more than 11,000 Louisianans have signed up for disaster assistance. Many are waiting for the flood waters to drain away so they can determine what can be salvaged from their sodden homes and businesses.

Emergency crews already have rescued more than 20,000 people and continued to search for more after a storm dumped more than 2 feet (61 cm) of rain in three days.

Aerial photographs on Sunday showed houses inundated in mud-colored water with only their roofs visible while the bridge over the Amite River around Port Vincent, Louisiana, was almost underwater. People had become trapped overnight in their cars when the water rose on Saturday over parts of a major interstate around Baton Rouge.

While some rivers were receding on Monday, others downstream were still cresting.

“The water started rising three or four days ago and it’s still coming up right now,” said Lonnie Wells, 59, as he stood on flooded state highway in French Settlement, a town in southern Livingston Parish.

Wells said he would try to ride out the floods with his chickens, rabbits, goats and dogs, although neighbors urged him to flag down a passing Louisiana National Guard truck to get out.

The Louisiana flooding, which prompted U.S. President Barack Obama to issue a disaster declaration, resulted in seven deaths, National Weather Service meteorologist Jennifer McNatt said. Four occurred when people drove vehicles into high waters.

“IT’S GOING TO TAKE A WHILE”

The flood waters were expected to linger.

“It is going to take a while for that water to make its way out,” McNatt, who is based in Fort Worth, Texas, said in a telephone interview.

Rivers in Louisiana crested at record levels in multiple places, with the Amite River reaching 46.2 feet (14 meters) in Denham Springs, 5 feet (1.5 meters) higher than a 1983 record, McNatt said.

In flood-ravaged Livingston Parish, scores of people woke up on Monday in packed emergency shelters, sprawled out wherever they could find room. Emergency rescuers worked through the night to bring to safety people who were still stranded in roads in the middle of subdivisions, surrounded by flood water.

Pierre and Barbara Pitard, both 76, had just minutes to leave their home in Denham Springs as the water rose rapidly. The couple fled first to a neighbor’s two-story house before moving on to a Walmart, a gas station and a community center. They were finally rescued by boat and carried to safety on Saturday night, the vessel rocking as it hit submerged pickup trucks on streets inundated by water.

Pierre Pitard accepted the damage to his home but fretted about the scope of the state’s devastation.

“It’s already under water,” he said of his house. “I’m worried about how you go about getting it fixed because you’ve got thousands of people now with the exact same problems.”

Some 11,000 people already have registered with the federal government’s disaster assistance website, Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards said in a Twitter post on Monday morning.

Flooding in Texas was a concern on Monday with the NWS saying a flood watch extended from Houston to the Hill Country region in the central part of the state. Rain also could menace parts of Arkansas in the next two days, McNatt said.

(Writing by Letitia Stein; Editing by Bill Trott)