Maybe it's not such a good thing you guys have had warm weather....
http://thenewsdispatch.com/main.asp?Sectio...;ArticleID=8528Northern Indiana Flooding Kills 3, Including 2 Kids
By Ken Kusmer
Associated Press
REMINGTON, Ind. - Heavy rain and melting snow pushed Indiana rivers and streams over their banks Tuesday, with floodwaters killing at least three people, including two children in an SUV that plunged into several feet of water.
A mother was driving her five children along a flooded rural road near Rochester when her SUV stalled in the deep water, the Fulton County Sheriff's Department said. The Chevy Tahoe then floated into even deeper water near the city 45 miles south of South Bend.
The driver, 29-year-old Megihann K. Leininger of rural Fulton County, rescued three of her children, ages 3 months to 4 years. But she was unable to get to 5-year-old Shay Leininger and 2-year-old Ashley Pruitt, who died, the sheriff's department said.
Lynn Breeden said she saw the SUV enveloped by water at the intersection and called 911. She said she did not suspect the water was so deep.
"It was flowing really heavy, really fast," said Breeden, a youth pastor at the church the family belongs to. "I looked back over and the car was almost under. It just happened fast."
The rising waters forced hundreds to evacuate and turned dry roads into deadly flash floods in north-central Indiana. Jasper, White, Carroll and Benton counties declared states of emergency.
In Remington, about 55 miles southwest of Rochester, 56-year-old Ronnie D. Napier of Goodland drowned when his truck was swept into Carpenter Creek floodwaters about 4:30 a.m., said Shawn Brown, a conservation officer with the Department of Natural Resources.
"Witnesses ... saw him in the creek and they saw him go underneath the bridge and never saw him again," Brown said.
Karen Wilson, Jasper County Emergency Management director, said up to 150 people were evacuated in Remington and up to 30 homes were affected by water that reached waist-high levels in some places. Between 50 and 60 people were taken to the First Christian Church, many from a mobile home park on the edge of the city.
One of those evacuees, Linda Kleinschmidt, 53, said she, her husband, son and godson were rescued about 3 a.m. from their rented mobile home by sheriff's deputies in a Hummer. Water was rising about 6 inches every half an hour on the steps outside their home, she said.
"They came around pounding on the doors, telling everybody we had to get out because the water was rising," Kleinschmidt said. "It got pretty scary."
A crew from the Indiana Department of Transportation was inspecting a bridge on U.S. 24 east of the city. The road was closed for more than 20 miles between Reynolds and Interstate 65.
"We're concerned about the bridge and roadway under the bridge being undermined, that is, washed out," said INDOT spokesman Joshua Bingham.
Streets in Remington were blocked by standing water, but some places were dry enough for children to throw around a football and a woman to ride a bike.
In White County, rescuers in boats evacuated hundreds of people in Monticello, Blue Water Beach and Diamond Point about 80 miles northwest of Indianapolis, said county emergency management director Gordon Cochran.
Carroll County Emergency Management director Dave McDowell said a couple hundred homes might be flooded but many were unoccupied summer residences.
The weather service reported near-record flooding at the Norway and Oakdale dams just north of Monticello, a city of 5,700 people about 25 miles north of Lafayette.
Just outside of Delphi, waters below the Oakdale dam rose above the tops of cars on both sides of the Tippecanoe River.
"We rescued a couple of people off the roofs of their houses," said Matt Tholen, a DNR conservation officer. "This was the most water I've seen ever."
The weather service said that neither dam was expected to fail but urged residents to closely monitor the situation along the river, which had continued to rise. Officials recommended that all residents south of the Oakdale Dam leave their homes.
INDOT said several highways, including all I-65 southbound lanes in Jasper County, would be closed until floodwaters recede.
Flood warnings were in effect all along the Wabash and Tippecanoe rivers. The American Red Cross had set up shelters in Lafayette and Delphi, and smaller towns along the flood path also had places for residents to go.
The thunderstorms that dumped from 3 to 6 inches of rain were accompanied by record warmth across much of the eastern half of the nation. Several Indiana cities hit record highs in the 60s.
The warmth melted the snow pack, which combined with heavy rain, triggered the flooding, said Phil Gray, a spokesman for the National Weather Service in Indianapolis. He noted that some of the counties that saw the heaviest flooding had as much as 10 inches of snow on the ground.
"That saturated the ground and fills up the small streams just by its melting," he said. "Then excessive rainfall caused the flooding to develop rapidly."
Meanwhile, another storm that pushed into the state from the southwest Tuesday night triggered flash flood warnings for Bloomington and several southern Indiana counties. Flooding from that storm, however, was not nearly as severe, said Sally Pavlow, a meteorologist with the weather service's Indianapolis bureau.
