N.Va. Hit Hardest by Fast-Moving Storm
By Nick Miroff, Philip Rucker and David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, September 7, 2008
The first tropical storm to hit the Washington area this season left the region windblown and thoroughly soaked yesterday, causing one fatal car accident, flooding dozens of roads and turning quiet suburban creeks into fast-rising, muddy rivers.
Tropical Storm Hanna finally departed yesterday evening, heading off to Long Island, N.Y., and points to the northeast after dropping more than seven inches of rain in some parts of the area.
The most affected spots in this area seemed to be in Northern Virginia, including one Fairfax County neighborhood that was forced to evacuate. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D) said that Prince William County -- where Neabsco Creek swelled up and swallowed Route 1 -- was the hardest-hit county in his state.
Sunny skies were predicted to return today and tomorrow as forecasters turned their attention to far-off Hurricane Ike, which grew to Category 4 strength yesterday as it churned on an uncertain path, threatening millions. Latest forecasts suggested that it would skirt the southern tip of Florida, move westward across Cuba and head northwest into the Gulf of Mexico.
Officials said that Hanna's effects could linger as crews remove fallen trees and restore power to almost 10,000 metropolitan area customers who lacked it last night. The figure had been much higher earlier in the day.
At the end of the day, officials said Hanna lacked the tropical wallop they had feared. Tropical storm force winds appeared not to reach the immediate Washington area. The storm was less like Hurricane Isabel, which brought heavy winds and wide-scale flooding in 2003, and more like a large thunderstorm system. At Reagan National Airport, the peak wind was 33 mph, six miles an hour less than the minimum for a tropical storm.
But, in many places across the area, the storm was plenty.
"There's a river now that flows through my back yard, and it got up to within three feet from my house," said Marjorie Knowles, whose Vienna home was threatened by an overflowing drainage ditch. "I mean, I'm not big on prayer, but I'm praying."
One of the storm's biggest impacts was in the Huntington neighborhood of Fairfax County, where about 50 people were evacuated from their homes as Cameron Run rose and flooded streets. The water began receding about 6 p.m., and some homeowners were allowed to return by about 8 p.m., but officials were going house-to-house to look for structural damage or backed-up sewage.
County spokeswoman Merni Fitzgerald said that the residents -- whose neighborhood was flooded by a similar storm in 2006 -- were not being allowed to return until the inspections were complete.
Hanna made landfall near the North Carolina-South Carolina border about 3:15 a.m. yesterday, dropping five inches of rain in some places and causing minor damage. The storm had spent days drifting slowly across the Atlantic Ocean, but once over land it moved with purpose: By 6 a.m., it was dumping rain on southern Virginia.
By midday, it was raining more than an inch an hour in some parts of the Washington region. Cars hydroplaned on slick roads, hitting utility poles or each other.
Maryland State Police Sgt. J. Leichtman said people were driving too fast for the conditions, causing many accidents.
The fatal accident occurred just after noon on Interstate 95 in Prince George's County. The driver, headed south in a Toyota Tacoma truck, lost control near the Powder Mill Road exit and smashed into a tree in the highway median. He died at the scene, but an infant in the car survived. Their identities were not released yesterday.
Kaine said there were three deaths from storm-related crashes in the Richmond area.
In the Washington region, puddled water and fallen trees closed roads from Leesburg to North Beach, on the Calvert County shoreline. The storm's sustained winds were piddling by hurricane standards. But there were a couple of 40 mph gusts, and they still brought down tree limbs, and sometimes entire trees.
In Woodbridge, Rocio Chavaria, 18, was watching TV in the living room when he heard a loud crack. And then there was a tree branch sticking through the ceiling and into the kitchen.
"Water was coming in, and I said, 'Oh, Lord,' " Chavaria said. "I'm upset by the damage, but we're relieved that everybody's fine and no one got hurt."
Forecasters had predicted that Hanna might hit Southern Maryland and the Eastern Shore hardest. But Northern Virginia wound up being the storm's chief victim, hit repeatedly by bands of clouds from the storm's rainy northwest quadrant.
Weather officials said 5.11 inches fell at Dulles International Airport, and 6.19 inches in Leesburg. Kaine, in an afternoon conference call, said that some spots in Prince William received as much as nine inches. The National Airport figure was 3.5 inches.
And all that rain had to go somewhere.
In one section of Woodbridge, it filled a creek so high that it spilled out and covered Blackburn Road in ankle-deep water.
"I've lived here all my life, and I've never seen it like this," said Chris King, 43, who said he had seen a Papa John's Pizza delivery car splash through, defying a line of police flares.
Things were even worse at Neabsco Creek, which turned from a small stream to a brown torrent, 200 yards wide and carrying logs and other debris. Underneath it, five feet down, was a bridge carrying Route 1 over the creek. The state had been trying to raise the bridge, but didn't do it fast enough: The floodwaters submerged traffic cones and lapped at the treads of excavating machines.
Joan Morris, a spokeswoman for the Virginia Department of Transportation, said the street would probably remain closed even after the water subsided. "There's going to be a lot of debris to clean up," she said.
In Sterling, water from a nearby stream rose up to cover Maudud Alam's back yard, and then seeped into his house, reaching four inches high in two rooms.
"Water has never risen this high before," said Alam, 65, an art restorer. Alam said he has asked Loudoun County repeatedly to dredge the stream -- which he said floods frequently -- with no success.
Fairfax County engineers were inspecting the Pohick Creek dam late last night. A temporary spillway was constructed there yesterday to avoid the possibility of water flowing over the top of the dam, said Fitzgerald, the county spokeswoman.
As yesterday went on, the storm's center -- more of a rainy blob than a well-defined eye -- moved east across the lower Chesapeake Bay. In Ocean City, large waves crashed on tourists scampering on a boardwalk. On Maryland's low-lying Smith Island, the water was four inches deep on the main drag, Caleb Jones Road, and threatening the Methodist church's basement.
In St. Michaels, Md., the heavy rain brought water, and paddling ducks, nearly to the doorstep of the St. Michaels Crab and Steak House. That was in late afternoon, when high tide hadn't arrived.
"We still have five hours" until the tide peaks, owner Eric S. Rosen said. "If we have five hours, and you can't get in the front door now . . . " His thought trailed off.
But, as bad as Hanna was, officials across the region were also talking about what it wasn't. Unlike Isabel, yesterday's storm did not cause serious flooding near Annapolis's downtown City Dock.
"Right now, it's basically just a very wet weather event," said Edward Hopkins, chief of staff at the Maryland Emergency Management Agency. "It just appears to be a large-scale thunderstorm."
And so, amid the various watches and warnings from the National Weather Service, many people in the region tried to treat yesterday like a regular day. In the District, tourists browsed Smithsonian museums and piled onto tour buses, although they stayed away from the open-air second decks. At Temple Sinai in Northwest Washington, Hanna Samet's bat mitzvah went on despite the pounding rain.
"I thought it was hilarious that Hanna was coming," said Samet, 13. "I like what my cousin said: 'It's Hanna versus Hanna.' "
And even at the city's waterfront, right next to the churning Potomac, some people braved the rain to buy shrimp, crabs and tuna.
"I come here once or twice a month," said Neta Williams, 28, after buying two pounds of shrimp. She said she was unfazed by the weather. "I think it's going to blow over."
In the end, it did, heading toward Long Island and New England. Today's forecast for Washington: mostly sunny, with a high near 88.
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