Major flooding, power outages still a threat from Francine

Sept. 12 (UPI) -- Up to 14 million people remain under flood watches over an area stretching from the Florida Panhandle and New Orleans to as far north as Memphis as Francine transitioned from a hurricane to a tropical depression Thursday.

"The most important thing we can do is get our utilities back up and online. We had ... almost 500,000 people without power last night. That has drastically been improved, probably about by a 50% margin," Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry said. "Power is the most important thing that we need right now."

Winds dropped to 35 mph, but millions of people remained concerned about flooding and thousands remained without power Thursday night as the storm moved inland.

"Francine will continue to lose wind energy as it spends the remainder of its life over land," AccuWeather lead hurricane expert Alex DaSilva said. "However, as it transitions to a tropical rainstorm, it will still be very capable of producing life-threatening conditions."

Thunderstorms that spawn tornadoes threaten residents from the central Gulf Coast to Tennessee in the north, Georgia in the east and north-central Florida.

The National Hurricane Center said in a statement that "Francine will continue to bring heavy rainfall and the risk of flash and urban flooding, along with river flooding, across portions of the Lower Mississippi Valley, Tennessee Valley and the Southeast."

According to Accuweather, Francine will carry 1 to 4 inches of rain northward into the middle Mississippi and lower Ohio valleys "with a pocket where 4 to 8 inches of rain will fall with locally higher amounts centered on the state of Mississippi."

As of 11 p.m. Thursday, poweroutage.us reported 157, 382 Louisiana customers without electrical power. Mississippi had 1,840 outages. Alabama had 13,063 and Tennessee had 9,229 without power.

According to WWNO in New Orleans, the highest rainfall totals were 8 to 10 inches, mostly in Lafourche, St. John, St. Charles and Jefferson parishes.

St. Charles Parish President Matthew Jewell reported Wednesday the parish was experiencing high water, flooding streets and homes.