IAGary and all

Forgot to mention in the post below about storm damage. I 26 closure due to river being up to the bottom of the bridges and hwy. Dept. worried about damage they could not see. A number of years ago this area i/n the upstate has 13 inches of rain in a short time with river flooding and a section of an ole abandoned steel bridge washed away. I went over to a nearby town on that river to a modern highway bridge where the water was up near the bottom of the bridge and starting to eat away at the bank under the bridge. You could feel the vibration of the heavy flow of water. The bridge survived. I don't know the location of the bridge washing out in Spartanburg, but someone drove into the hole there and a woman drowned. This was a culvert, not a bridge.

Senator Graham says the damage will be over a Billion dollars in the state. I think it is too soon to make an estimate but time will tell.

It's amazing the number of people who drive around barricades and along flooded roads. There is a youtube video of a big truck in Sumter, SC driving along a flooded road and getting out where the road starts to rise. He was driving in waer over the wheels and almost up to the bottom of the trailer. I will leave it to truckers on here to comment about damage to the truck, but this illustrates how wide spread flooding was since Sumter is a considerable distance from Columbia.

KEH

That's just foolish, the week prior, 9-30 or so, the remainder of a tropical storm passed through here with significant rainfall, amounts we don't see regularly. Not sure what the totals were, but it was enough to get a trickle in my basement, which means s loy(thankfully it runs to a floor drain). This basement is bone dry all year, no sump pit, don't need one. First time I ever saw this leak was when T.S. Irene passed through, that was 10" for us. We missed hurricane Sandy a year later. I was headed home in the evening, after working on a job 33 miles to the west and when I came to a narrow railroad underpass/bridge, that is lower than all the surrounding elevations,(probably to make clearance) which is 11'-2" overhead, it was flooded out. I backed out as there is an easy way to bypass it via a fork to the right, but the opposing driver stopped, then started through it, was over the wheels, not sure why people do it, but some just don't think about it and realize.

Watching the radar on this heavy concentrate rain event was hard to believe what you were seeing, it unloaded like a "conveyor belt" per the weather persons words, never saw anything like it on the weather radar, just lined up over SC. We had a series of rain storms, June '13, that came up the hudson valley like that, consecutive or 2-3 day storms, but not one continuous event like just occurred. I assume the humid air just concentrated in a corridor from the the hurricane and was meeting with cool air, and some how was stable enough to stay put, keep that humid air rolling in to create that relentless, never ending rain.

Don't have to be rain but that seems most common. Here we have barriers that the cops can lower to block access to the interstate when we get a lot of snow or bad ice. People still get caught driving around them. Most don't stop to think that they can die out there.

Hope it isn't too bad for you guys out there.

Rick

Not only can they die out there after driving around that barricade, so can the rescuers that try to save them. There is a good reason to stay on the right side of the barricade.

Heard 2 railroad guys went around a baracade this morning truck went in a hole and they both drowned .That was on WBTV channel 3 this morning . I guess folks think the state emergency services put those baracades up just to have something to do.

I was confused about the death mentioned above. There has been so much going on it's hard to keep up with it. The 57 year old lady drowned in a railroad underpass that dates from the 1920s or before, the date is on the underpass and I have been through there hundreds of times, but the exact year escapes me. It is barely wide enough for cars made in the last 70 years to meet, but it can be done if both are careful. It doesn't take a lot of rain to flood it and locals are well aware of the danger there. Judging by the lady's name she may be a recent immigrant and not aware of the bloody history of that underpass.

A culvert did wash out and a pickup went in the hole. The 2 men in it got out.

The underpass is 2-3 blocks from the sheriff's department's headquarters. The underpass danger is so well known they may not bother to block it when it floods, but I wasn't there and don't know.

Nearer the coast the rivers are rising as water dropped in the upstate works it way down. Hope everyone there stays safe. There are 2 rivers that run into Charleston harbor, the Ashley and the Cooper. News says the Ashley is rising.

KEH

Why do people drive around barricades??
Here are a few reasons......
Around where I live, they go overboard closing streets and blocking off main roads. I have seen them close a road for just an inch of water. And, this was after the rain had stopped and there was no further danger of flooding.
Then there are the ones that just want to get HOME after a long day at whatever they do all day. Now, when the route is blocked, they turn around and take another route only to find that one also blocked. Frustration sets in and finally, they go around a barrier. Most times (at least around here) there is no problem with doing that. Worst case is usually a stalled car or getting stuck in a pothole that they did not see.
Most of the time, the potential danger is disregarded something like in the little boy who cried WOLF!!! After a while, you see a barricade in a spot that you travel often, and KNOW that the water cannot be over a couple of inches deep, and just go for it.

As for myself, if I see running or rapid water, I find another route. If I see water flowing over a small bridge, I do not try to cross it. In any case, if I do not KNOW how deep the water is, I find another route.

TWP will close roads to fill potholes, county and TWP will close roads to mow grass