Powerful storm hits large parts of eastern US

Washington, DC [US]: A powerful storm has battered large areas of the eastern US. The storm has knocked out power across several states, leading to multiple rescues. It delivered its final blow to New England on Wednesday, CNN reported. 

On Wednesday, multiple rivers were at major flood stage in the eastern US, most of them in the Northeast and mid-Atlantic. Flooding forced evacuations in New Jersey and Connecticut, where the Yantic River came perilously close to hitting a record high level and a dam was damaged. 

In Alabama, Georgia and North Carolina, as many as four deaths were reported as storms hit the states with fierce winds, rain and tornadoes. 

An 81-year-old woman was among those killed after her Cottonwood, Alabama, mobile home was flipped multiple times on Tuesday, according to Houston County Commission Chairman Brandon Shoupe. 

The number of power outages dropped as the storm moved away, but more than 120,000 homes and businesses were in the dark on Wednesday night in the eastern US, primarily in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Vermont and Maine, according to PowerOutage.us. And high temperatures in the Northeast were expected to top out only in the 30s and 40s on Wednesday, leaving many without power in frigid weather, as per CNN. 

The storm generated 25 tornado reports across Texas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina since Monday. In South Carolina, “significant damage” from a potential tornado was reported in the city of Bamberg, 60 miles south of Columbia, where the century-old City Hall building collapsed, according to city clerk-treasurer Robin Chavis. 

A section of Interstate 80 in Iowa had to be closed down on Tuesday afternoon due to whiteout conditions that led to a multi-vehicle crash. In Kansas, around 30 people, including children, got stranded and had to be rescued from vehicles and taken to a high school during blizzard and whiteout conditions on Monday, CNN reported.