Tennessee Woman Killed by Floodwaters After Going Live on Facebook

Rising floodwaters swept a Tennessee woman to her loss of life on Saturday as she stay streamed the harrowing ordeal on Facebook. In a video posted at 10:13 a.m., Linda Almond, 55, might be heard narrating as a number of toes of murky brown water rush previous the window of her residence that sat on the epicenter of Tennessee’s largest rainstorm ever recorded.

“Well, if anybody’s seeing me on Facebook Live, we’re being flooded right now,” Almond mentioned in the course of the 70-second clip. “This is scary,” she added. “Really scary.”

Towards the tip of the video, a person’s voice might be heard off-camera saying, “I think something just hit the side of the house.” Almond’s daughter, Victoria, advised the Washington Post that her brother, Tommy, had been in the home along with her mom in the course of the flood. Just moments after the video cuts off, the home was reportedly “lifted off its foundation” by the coursing deluge, sending Linda and her son into the present.

“My brother went down for about 45 seconds underwater and when he came back up, he couldn’t find mom,” Victoria Almond mentioned. “It was the last time he saw her.”

At least 22 people have been confirmed useless in Tennessee and a minimum of 18 individuals had been nonetheless lacking on Tuesday morning after greater than 17 inches (43 centimeters) of rain fell throughout the central a part of the state, unleashing widespread flash floods. Waverly—the small city the place Linda Almond lived—was among the many hardest hit areas within the state. Two 7-month-old twins have additionally been counted amongst Waverly’s victims, swept from their father’s arms as he tried to cling to them throughout Saturday’s floods.

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The position that local weather change performs in an more and more lengthy listing of utmost climate within the U.S.—which now contains flash floods, raging wildfires, excessive drought, and blistering warmth—is plain. In the case of floods, a hotter environment can maintain extra water. That, in flip, results in downpours just like the one which hit Tennessee—and like these we’ve seen around the globe this summer season from China to Europe. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report revealed this month discovered that intense rainfall is now 30% extra frequent around the globe.

On Tuesday, President Joe Biden accredited an emergency disaster declaration for Humphreys County, Tennessee, which can reportedly unlock federal help to assist with restoration efforts. The pattern towards extra excessive rainfall and the heartbreaking scenes in Tennessee and elsewhere present along with restoration, we urgently have to adapt to our soggier, extra lethal local weather.