Heavy rain leaves drivers stranded, trees toppled across metro Atlanta

Flooding also possible late Friday, early Saturday, with more showers expected.

It was still dark Wednesday morning when Rico Lester was taken by surprise by standing water just a couple of minutes from his southeast Atlanta home. He didn’t see it in time to stop his vehicle. “All of a sudden, I see the water hit the hood of my car — the front of my car — then my car stalled and I couldn’t get out of the water,” he told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution from the scene along Hutchens Road.

The only thing he knew to do was to keep his doors shut and wait to be rescued, he said. He perched himself on his driver’s-side window as he and a woman in a car in front of him waited for firefighters to arrive.

“They called for their little boat,” Lester said. “The little boat showed up, came and pulled both of us out of the water.”

They were not alone. Up to 2½ inches of rain fell in metro Atlanta, leaving creeks and other waterways overflowing Wednesday. It led to several road closures and rescues, including one at a home in DeKalb County.

While the area will get a short reprieve from the rain today, another round of flooding is possible Friday evening with more widespread rain expected.

In Gresham Park, a family of four became trapped in their home — including one bedridden person — when a tree crashed through their roof, DeKalb fire spokesperson Capt. Jaeson Daniels said. Crews were called shortly before 4 a.m. to the home on Flagstone Drive, where firefighters rescued all four people, Daniels said. No injuries were reported.

Elsewhere, standing water was reported on several roads, including Key Road in DeKalb. Water had pooled on the bridge over Intrenchment Creek, making it impassable and forcing authorities to shut it down.

In Roswell, a large area near the Chattahoochee Nature Center on Willeo Road flooded and left some cars stranded there, too. The boardwalk along the river was fully inundated.

Several metro waterways remain under a flood warning today, with some alerts extending through Saturday morning. That includes several of the usual problem areas, such as the Chattahoochee and Yellow rivers and Peachtree Creek, according to the National Weather Service.

Another round of rain will arrive late Friday and is expected to last through the first half of Saturday. By then, some areas could see up to 4 inches of rain, Channel 2 Action News meteorologist Brian Monahan said.

“And because of all the rain we just saw, that flooding risk is going to be elevated into the weekend,” he said.

A tree fell on a house in the 2500 block of Flagstone Drive in DeKalb County. Crews were called shortly before 4 a.m., where firefighters rescued four people from the house. No injuries were reported, said DeKalb fire spokesperson Capt. Jaeson Daniels.

PHOTOS BY JOHN SPINK/JOHN.SPINK@AJC.COM Cars are stranded along Hutchens Road in southeast Atlanta after creeks overflowed. With heavy rain overnight, flash flood warnings were in effect early Wednesday for much of metro Atlanta.