AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist Jon Porter breaks down the threats facing the eastern U.S. this week.
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00:00 It's it's amazing how quickly we have to
00:02 shift gears because just a few days ago
00:04 we were talking about the heavy snow
00:06 threat here, but we kept on talking
00:08 about when we're done with this storm.
00:11 We've got to move on to what could be a
00:13 life threatening flash flooding event
00:15 coming across the Mid Atlantic in Northeast.
00:17 John, let's first talk about
00:19 the rain that's on the way.
00:21 Well, it's a key point here in the
00:23 rain is going to come fast and furious.
00:26 Look at it expand into the yellows
00:28 and dark greens right up along the I-95 corridor.
00:30 So a threat both from the excessive
00:32 rain that's going to be falling from
00:34 the sky plus snow melt from the
00:36 significant snow on the ground
00:38 outside the I-95 corridor.
00:39 The more and more we look at this,
00:42 the more this looks like a very
00:44 dangerous flash flooding situation
00:46 in parts of the Northeast.
00:47 You know, and if you live in New York City,
00:51 Central and Eastern Long Island,
00:52 Philadelphia, Washington DC,
00:53 you may say to yourself,
00:55 you know what we didn't get any
00:57 snow, but you have another problem.
01:00 How wet it's been.
01:02 The soil is so saturated.
01:03 Look at this map that shows the
01:05 rainfall over the last 30 days and
01:08 anywhere that's green or above and
01:09 getting into the dark greens here
01:11 above 100% of the historic average
01:14 long term average precipitation.
01:15 So you have these dark greens all
01:17 the way from Maine all the way back
01:20 to Massachusetts parts of upstate
01:21 New York, eastern Pennsylvania,
01:23 down to Washington, Baltimore.
01:24 So this area has very saturated
01:26 soil so there's nowhere else
01:28 for the water to go.
01:29 It can't take anymore.
01:30 The soil cannot take any more water,
01:32 so it's going to run off and result in
01:35 this serious life threatening flooding.
01:36 And you know, John,
01:37 let's take a look at the snow cover
01:39 right now as well because I've
01:41 been telling people this.
01:42 If you live, let's say South of the
01:44 New York State Thruway from the New
01:46 York State Thruway on South,
01:48 but the time you wake up on Wednesday
01:50 morning your snows gone. It is.
01:51 This is going to be this error is
01:53 going to have higher dew point.
01:55 This will be lots of moisture in the air.
01:58 It's snow eating air that's going
01:59 to be working on this snow cover,
02:01 and that's why we're so concerned
02:03 about the combination of heavy
02:05 rain and this snow melt.
02:06 It's going to be.
02:07 You're going to be surprised by how
02:09 quickly the snow is going to melt.
02:11 You know, John,
02:12 in this whole area certainly
02:14 is susceptible to flooding,
02:15 but here's the area that
02:17 we've really zoned in on.
02:18 Why do you explain what makes this
02:20 different, let's say,
02:21 then farther areas to the West?
02:23 OK, this is a very,
02:25 this is the area that we're most
02:27 concerned about the nasty flooding
02:29 here because of the fact that here
02:31 we're going to be dealing with.
02:33 The combination of the snow melt,
02:35 especially on the Western
02:36 periphery of this area from
02:37 Northeastern Pennsylvania up into
02:39 Western Massachusetts and Southern
02:40 New Hampshire. Plus,
02:41 this is also where there's going to
02:43 be the risk for several inches of
02:45 rainfall as that moist air is drawn
02:47 way up the eastern seaboard by
02:49 this strong storm system.
02:50 The other problem is that Bernie.
02:52 This is going to be happening at night.
02:55 Remember,
02:55 you've heard me talk about this before here.
02:58 Flooding issues at night are especially
03:00 dangerous because the water can quickly
03:02 rise. Look for flash flooding first,
03:03 then stream and Creek flooding,
03:05 and it will also translate to
03:07 river flooding here as well.
03:08 Really quickly, John.
03:09 The other concern here is this rain is
03:12 going to be accompanied by 40 to 50
03:14 mile per hour wind gusts,
03:15 specially along the eastern seaboard.
03:17 And we have some special messages
03:19 for you for Wednesday morning.
03:21 If you live in this area highlighted,
03:23 you may have difficulty getting to
03:25 work in school on Wednesday morning.
03:27 This is a big deal in terms of not
03:29 only just the flooding issues and
03:31 remember turn around if you encounter.
03:34 Any flooding on roadways.
03:35 So many lives are lost due to
03:37 issues with flooding on roadways,
03:39 and then in addition to that,
03:40 we're going to power outage issues.
03:42 Lots of trees coming down because
03:44 of the wind and the combination
03:46 of that saturated soil.
03:47 This looks like a major story.
03:49 Stay very close to this year here
03:51 on the Accuweather network in the
03:53 Accuweather app over the coming days.
03:55 Chief Meteorologist John Porter.
03:56 John thanks again for joining us.