Flood warnings after US hurricane

RIVERS swollen by Hurricane Sally’s rains threaten more misery for some residents of the Florida Panhandle and south Alabama on Thursday. It comes as the storm’s remnants are forecast to dump as much as a 1ft of rain and spread the threat of flooding to Georgia and the Carolinas.

Coastal residents, meanwhile, looked to begin the recovery from a storm that turned streets into rivers, ripped roofs off buildings, knocked out power to hundreds of thousands and killed at least one person.

People in Florida were warned in flooded areas they will need to remain vigilant as water from the hurricane subsides because heavy rains to the north are expected to cause flooding in Panhandle rivers

Sally weakened to a tropical depression late on Wednesday and picked up speed. The National Hurricane Centre said its centre will move out of south-east Alabama and across central Georgia on Thursday, reaching South Carolina on Thursday night.

The storm has been dumping heavy rains over central and northern Georgia and western South Carolina. The National Weather Service said up to a 1ft of rain could accumulate in parts of Georgia, where multiple flash food warnings were issued Thursday.

THE number of confirmed coronavirus cases in India has surged past the 5 million mark.

The country’s Health Ministry reported a record 90,123 new cases in the past 24 hours, raising its confirmed total to 5,020,359, about 0.35% of its population of nearly 1.4 billion.

It said 1,290 more people died in the past 24 hours, for a total of 82,066 deaths. India’s total coronavirus caseload is closing in on the United States’ highest tally of more than 6.6 million cases.

India reported a record daily high of 97,570 cases on September 11 and has added more than 1 million cases in September alone. Experts warned that India’s case fatality rate could increase in coming weeks with lockdown restrictions relaxed except in high-risk areas. But authorities ruled out imposing a second countrywide lockdown as recoveries were growing at more than 78%. Its death rate is 1.6%, far lower than 3% each in the United States and Brazil, according to the Johns Hopkins Medicine and University. Most of India’s deaths are concentrated in its large cities: Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai and Pune. But smaller urban centres in Mahrashtra like Nagpur or Jalgaon have also reported more than 1,000 deaths. Maharashtra state with more than 1 million cases remains the worst affected region in India, followed by Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh.