Debby will bring heavy flooding to Georgia and the Carolinas

Tropical Storm Debby continued its slow march into Georgia on Monday night, with forecasters warning residents across the southeastern United States that the threat of major flooding from the storm could last for the next several days.

The storm has already dumped heavy rain across northern Florida, where it was blamed for four deaths, led to dangerous river flooding and triggered hundreds of water rescues. In southern Georgia, the storm was linked to the death of a 19-year-old man killed by a falling tree.

The system’s languid pace was of particular concern to forecasters and officials because of the amount of rain the former hurricane could drop as it trundles across the region — as much as 30 inches in parts of South Carolina.

“This is a lot of water coming our way,” said Mayor William Cogswell of Charleston, South Carolina, which was bracing for as much as a foot of rain overnight.

“We need to take it very, very seriously,” he added.

Debby came ashore as a Category 1 hurricane, with sustained winds of 80 mph, at Steinhatchee, a village of about 500 people that sits on a sparsely populated stretch of the Florida coastline known as the Big Bend.

It is predicted to cross Georgia and South Carolina, before heading back out to sea, where it could absorb even more moisture before making a second landfall in North Carolina later this week.

Here are more details:

Inland flooding: Though storm surge was receding from coastal communities, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida said that officials anticipated more flooding from rain and swelling rivers. About 500 residents of a Sarasota neighborhood were evacuated from their homes Monday, some by rescue boats, as Phillippi Creek swelled with rain.

Back out to sea: The National Hurricane Center predicts a storm surge of up to 4 feet on the Georgia and Carolina coasts by midweek after Debby moves offshore. The governors of those states declared emergencies, and officials in cities like Savannah, Georgia, and Charleston, South Carolina, issued curfews to keep people off flooding streets overnight.

Busy season: Debby is the fourth named storm of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season. Seventeen to 25 named storms are expected before the season ends in late fall. In July, Hurricane Beryl became the earliest Category 5 hurricane ever recorded before it struck Texas at Category 1 strength, resulting in at least 23 deaths, according to officials, and leaving parts of the state without power for days.

Climate’s role: Hurricanes have become more destructive over time, in no small part because of the influences of a warming planet. Climate change is producing more powerful storms that generate heavier rainfall and flooding. But humans also make storm damage more extensive by continuing to build in vulnerable parts of the coast.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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