New York: Four Indian-origin people were among over 50 people killed in US states of New Jersey and New York after they were swept away by flash floods caused by Hurricane Ida. A report in patch.com said 31-year-old Dhanush Reddy died last week after being swept into a 36-inch storm sewer pipe in New Jersey. Another Indian origin person, Malathi Kanche, 46, a software designer, was driving home when her vehicle was hit by waist-deep floodwater in New Jersey. Malathi was swept away in the torrent and was confirmed dead. In Queens, New York, Tara Ramskriet and her 22-year-old son, Nick, drowned when their apartment was flooded, leaving them trapped inside.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy announced that 23 people died as a result of the storm, which made landfall in Louisiana as a Category 4 hurricane, reports Xinhua news agency. “The majority of these deaths were individuals who got caught in their vehicles by flooding and were overtaken by the water,” Murphy tweeted. At least 15 people died in New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio said. Among them, four women, three men and a two-year-old boy died in the basements of residential homes in separate flooding incidents in Queens, according to an NBC report, citing New York Police Department Commissioner Dermot Shea. Many commuters were stranded overnight in the New York subway stations, some sleeping on benches with service suspended and no way to get to their destinations, according to local media reports.
Central Park in New York City recorded 3.15 inches of rainfall in just one hour, surpassing the previous recorded high of 1.94 inches in one hour during Tropical Storm Henri on August 21.There were three people reportedly killed in Pennsylvania, one in Maryland and one in Connecticut.
Authorities also located the body of a Virginia resident missing in flooding earlier this week.
The powerful storm in southern New Jersey levelled a stretch of houses. More than 1,50,000 homes in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania remain without power, and states of emergency have been declared across the region. The extremely heavy rain turned streets and subway platforms into rivers and sent emergency responders in boats rescuing people from the rooftops of cars. Hundreds of people on trains and subways were evacuated.
