Flash Flood Emergency Hits Arkansas After 10 Inches of Rain, Weather Service Says

A map as of Wednesday, July, 17, 2024, shows where flash flood warnings have been declared across Arkansas and Missouri. (US Geological Survey)

Widespread flash flooding occurred across Arkansas and Missouri on Wednesday, and evacuations were taking place after a significant amount of rain fell in several hours, federal weather forecasters said.

A flash flood emergency was issued by the National Weather Service (NWS) for Summit and Yellville, Arkansas, on Wednesday morning. Both Summit and Yellville are located in Marion County, located in the Ozark Mountains.

“This is a PARTICULARLY DANGEROUS SITUATION. SEEK HIGHER GROUND NOW!” the NWS office in Little Rock warned in a Wednesday morning bulletin that has since expired.

As of 2:45 p.m. ET, an area of north-central Arkansas and one county in Missouri were under flash flood warnings, according to the NWS.

Earlier Wednesday, flash flood warnings were also issued for parts of southeastern Kansas, southern Missouri, and other areas in Arkansas. However, those expired later in the day.

Officials in Marion County, Arkansas, confirmed that a bridge over Moccasin Creek was washed out by flooding on Wednesday. Government offices, it added, were shut down for the day and court was also canceled.

A number of roads are also “washed out and some evacuations are taking place,” said the NWS Little Rock office in an earlier post.

More than 10 inches of rain fell in the past 24 hours in some parts of Arkansas, the office said in a later update. As of Wednesday afternoon, the NWS said that “widespread flash flooding” was ongoing along with road closures and washouts.

Buses and ambulances evacuated 86 people from a nursing home in Yellville, where water rose to about 4 feet during flash flooding, Marion County Sheriff Gregg Alexander said.

In Flippin, Arkansas, people went door to door to get as many as 40 residents to flee dangerous conditions before floodwaters began to recede, Mayor Heith Hogan said.

“We’re not griping, because we absolutely needed the rain, but it will take a little while for us to drain out and clean the roadways back up,” the sheriff said.

Nearly 5 inches of rain fell overnight on the tourist hub of Branson, Missouri. Taney County Sheriff Brad Daniels said several campgrounds were evacuated and people had to be rescued from a flooded mobile home park in nearby Hollister.

“Due to heavy rains and flooding expect traffic delays in various locations around the county,” said the Taney County Sheriff’s Office on social media, adding that several highways and roads are either closed or that only one lane is open.

Outside of the Ozarks, several areas in upstate New York after a storm hit the region on Tuesday with heavy winds and lightning. The NWS confirmed a tornado in the city of Rome, which reportedly damaged vehicles and infrastructure.

This week’s severe weather struck the Chicago area especially hard. The weather service said it confirmed 17 tornadoes hit northern Illinois and northwestern Indiana, including 11 during a single stretch of extraordinary storms Monday night.

According to PowerOutage.us, some 67,000 customers in Illinois were without power, and 21,000 lacked electricity in neighboring Indiana.

On Tuesday, officials in the town of Nashville, Illinois, issued an evacuation order for an area of the town downstream from a reservoir due to a dam failure. But on Tuesday night, Washington County’s Emergency Management Agency said that the Army Corps of Engineers was called to assess whether the dam and reservoir were safe.

“At this time, without further rain, the immediate safety concern has passed,” the agency said. “The secondary dam reacted as designed, helping prevent a full dam failure.”

But they said that repairs to the reservoir in Nashville will be required “sooner rather than later,” according to county officials, to maintain the dam’s integrity. Residents can return to the areas that were previously evacuated on Tuesday, it said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.