Fort Lauderdale got 25 inches of rain in ‘unprecedented’ storm

Fort Lauderdale’s airport remained closed for a second day Thursday after greater than 2 feet of rain fell on the South Florida city, flooding roads, swamping cars and stranding travelers, officials said.

“The quantity of rainfall is unprecedented,” Mayor Dean Trantalis said Thursday.

And it wasn’t over. One other round of rain Thursday flooded roads that had been passable, the town government said, and residents were urged to remain off the roads.

A further 2 to three inches of rain fell Thursday, the National Weather Service said.

There have been 900 calls for service to the town’s fire department, including rescues, Trantalis said earlier within the day, but no deaths have been reported. Around 600 people were taken to shelters, the town said.

Drone video broadcast by NBC Miami showed abandoned cars littering downtown, at the same time as the waters had receded.

Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, which stopped flight operations Wednesday after exits, entrances and runways flooded, will remain closed until 9 a.m. Friday to revive runway operations and do inspections, the airport said.

Parts of the town of 180,000 saw 25.91 inches of rain by 9 a.m. Thursday, while nearby Dania Beach got over 17 inches and Hollywood received a little bit greater than 18 inches, in response to the National Weather Service, although the reports were preliminary.

Sleeping on the airport was the toughest part for Jessica Pfau, of Baltimore, who was stranded for the night along together with her 4 children, husband, and the youngsters’s grandfather.

“I believe we perhaps got 4 hours of sleep, and it was freezing,” she said. They were attempting to get a rental automotive Thursday.

Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday declared a state of emergency for Broward County, where Fort Lauderdale is, and the county government also declared an area emergency.

Broward County Public Schools canceled classes Thursday and said schools could be closed Friday as well. Staff was repairing facilities Thursday but some areas were unreachable, the district said.

“To date, we have now been in a position to assess preliminarily $2 million in damages to our schools,” Valerie Wanza, acting chief of staff for the varsity district, said at a briefing. “Lots of it’s because of flooding.”

The heavy rain was attributable to a slow-moving frontal system, combined with a low pressure system within the Gulf of Mexico, the weather service said Thursday. That led to prolonged periods of very heavy rain, with the heaviest in Broward County it said.

There have been also two tornadoes in Broward County on Wednesday. Each were short-lived and were rated at EF0, or the bottom on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, in response to the weather service.

One happened around 3:30 p.m. and caused minimal damage, possibly just on the tree-top level, and the second hit around 9:40 p.m. just south of Fort Lauderdale’s airport, the agency said.

By Thursday night the heavy rain had come to an end, but a flood warning remained for the Fort Lauderdale area until 8 a.m. Friday because quite a few roads remained flooded, the weather service said.