[SUP]Brothers Logan Froehler, 17, at left, and Lukas, 11, throw a football while kayaking in their backyard on the Isle of Palms, South Carolina.
[/SUP]While spared the full fury of Hurricane Joaquin, parts of the US east coast still saw record-setting rain on Saturday that shut down roads, waterlogged crops and showed little sign of letting up.
Much of the drenching was centered on the Carolinas, but coastal communities as far away as New Jersey were feeling the effects of unrelenting rainfall. Rain and flood warnings remained in effect for many parts of the east coast through Sunday.
President Barack Obama declared a state of emergency in South Carolina and ordered federal aid to help state and local efforts.
Downtown Charleston was closed to incoming traffic as rain flooded roads and left some motorists stranded as flood waters engulfed their cars. At least two bridges were washed out in other parts of the state.
“Where we normally are dealing with flooding for a few hours, we’re dealing with it in days here,” Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen said. “We’re seeing areas flood today that did not traditionally flood.”
Several shelters were opened in coastal counties while health officials warned people not to swim or play in the flood waters. Inland areas of South Carolina also were battered by rain. In Columbia, which is in the middle of the state, business owners spent Saturday caulking and duct-taping windows and readying sandbags.
The Greenville-Spartanburg Airport in South Carolina recorded 2.3in of rain Saturday, smashing the previous record of 0.77in set in 1961, according to John Tomko, National Weather Service (NWS) meteorologist at Greenville-Spartanburg.
“This one is extraordinary in that it’s such a prolonged event,” he said.