Long Island Gets Summer's Worth of Rain in a Day

Some locales saw 13 inches
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Aug 13, 2014 3:45 PM CDT
Long Island Gets Summer's Worth of Rain in a Day
Firefighters cross a flooded intersection on Route 110 in Farmingdale, Long Island.   (Frank Eltman)

A storm dumped an entire summer's worth of rain on parts of Long Island, stranding drivers in roads flooded with door-handle-high water today. The staggering total, over 13 inches, was recorded from last evening until this morning at an airport in the hamlet of Ronkonkoma in Islip. That was more than the area's normal total for June, July, and August of 11.75 inches, said a National Weather Service rep. More than 5 inches of it fell in just a one-hour period, from 5am to 6am today.

"It was up to my waist," said a man rescued in North Babylon by firefighters after his truck was swamped. "That little Miata over there was floating in the middle lane, literally floating." New York City ranged from under an inch in Central Park to over 3 inches at Kennedy Airport. But parts of New Jersey also got more than 7 inches of rain. Baltimore got 6.3 inches of rain, the highest total since 1933 and the second-highest since measurements were first taken in 1871. (More flooding stories.)

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