UNITED STATES Alberto downgraded to a depression

FORECASTERS DOWNGRADED Alberto to a stilldangerous depression Monday evening, warning heavy rains and an accompanying flood threat would continue in the aftermath of the storm’s landfall in the Florida Panhandle.

The Memorial Day strike on the Gulf Coast by the first named storm of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season drove holiday beachgoers away from roiling, dangerous surf. What had sprung up from the Gulf of Mexico as a subtropical storm was now a vast, soggy system trekking inland as it flung rain – heavy at times – all around the Southeast.

Forecasters warned that heavy downpours from the weakening system could raise the potential for life-threatening flash floods in coming hours or days across north Florida, much of Alabama and large areas of Georgia – and eventually into Tennessee and the Carolinas.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said the depression was centered at 11 p.m. Monday about 50 miles (80 kilometres) west-northwest of Dothan, Alabama. Its top sustained winds had dropped nearly in half to about 35 mph (55 kph). What remains of Alberto was crawling northward at about 12 mph (19 kph).

TWO JOURNALISTS KILLED

Authorities did not immediately attribute any deaths or injuries directly to Alberto. But in North Carolina, a television news anchor and a photojournalist were killed Monday when a tree that had been uprooted from rain-soaked ground toppled on their SUV as they reported on severe weather on the fringes of the huge system.

That was hundreds of miles (kilometres) from Alberto’s center and more rain is on the way.

Between four and eight inches (10-25 centimeters) of rain could soak the Florida Panhandle, Alabama, and western Georgia before the storm moves on. Isolated deluges of 12 inches (30 centimetres) also are possible in spots as the system heads toward the Tennessee Valley yesterday and later this week into the Ohio Valley and Great Lakes region.