Floodwaters rise as killer storm stalks southeastern US

Catastrophic floods raised the threat of dam breaks and landslides across the southeastern United States on Monday, prolonging the agony caused by a killer hurricane that has left more than a dozen people dead and billions of dollars in damage.

Downgraded to a tropical depression, Florence slowly crawled over South and North Carolina, dumping heavy rains on already flood-swollen river basins that authorities warned could bring more death and destruction.The National Weather Service Weather Prediction Center warned Sunday night of “heavy and excessive rainfall over the next couple of days.”

There is an “elevated risk for landslides” in western North Carolina and southwest Virginia, as well as a danger of “catastrophic and life-threatening flash flooding” in parts of the Carolinas, it said.

Florence made landfall Friday as a Category 1 hurricane near Wrightsville Beach, 10 in North Carolina and five in South Carolina.

Forty miles to the south, the tiny town of Pollocksville, population 300, found itself cut in two on Sunday afternoon after the River Trent burst its banks.

-AFP