Reply #16: Up to 200,000 told to flee Northeast flooding

[Earth_First]

Up to 200,000 told to flee Northeast flooding
Storm kills 12; state of emergency declared in more than 50 counties



As water rises above the banks of the Schuylkill River, Philadelphia Water Department workers remove submerged sandbags to reuse and protect a firehouse and nearby homes.

ALLENTOWN, Pa. - Up to 200,000 people in the Wilkes-Barre area were ordered to evacuate their homes Wednesday because of rising water on the Susquehanna River, swelled by a record-breaking deluge that had killed at least 12 people across the Northeast.

Thousands more were ordered to leave their homes in New Jersey, New York and Maryland. Rescue helicopters plucked residents from rooftops as rivers and streams surged over their banks, washed out roads and bridges, and cut off villages in some of the worst flooding in the region in decades.

Wilkes-Barre, a northeastern Pennsylvania city that was devastated by deadly flooding in 1972 from the remnants of Hurricane Agnes, is protected by levees, and officials said the Susquehanna was expected to crest just a few feet from the tops of the 41-foot floodwalls.

An estimated 2,200 people were ordered to evacuate the area around Lake Needwood at Rockville, Md., which was approaching 25 feet above normal. Engineers reported weakened spots on the lake’s earthen dam.

More at link: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/13589161/?GT1=8211