Flood — Madison, Florida

2024-08-08 to 2024-08-26 · near Hopewell, Madison, Florida

Event narrative

Long duration areal flooding occurred across southeast Madison county due to heavy rainfall of around 12 inches from Hurricane Debby. The Ragans Family Campground was flooded and forced to close, which resulted in a few hundred campers being evacuated. Other homes and rural roads were inundated in the area. The flooding was slow to recede in some areas and lasted all the way through August 26th.

Wider weather episode

Hurricane Debby made landfall along the Taylor County coast as a Category 1 Hurricane on the morning of Monday August 5th. In addition to storm surge flooding along the FL Big Bend coast, around 12 inches of rainfall lead to widespread flooding in Madison and Taylor counties. In particular, rainfall in Southeast Madison County corresponded to a 0.2% annual chance occurrence or a 500 year flood event. Long duration areal flooding occurred in southeast Madison county for around 3 weeks. Flooding also occurred along portions of the Aucilla, Fenholloway, Steinhatchee and Withlacoochee rivers. Tropical storm force winds also led to power outages in the Florida Big Bend and South-Central Georgia. There were two direct fatalities from trees falling on homes in Dixie County, Florida and Moultrie, Georgia. Two indirect fatalities also occurred in Dixie County due to a traffic accident. The highest water marks measured by a survey team from FDEM were around 3 feet AGL in Horseshoe Beach. The University of Florida estimated that agriculture losses across Florida were between $93.7 million and $263.2 million, including crops, livestock, aquaculture, and animal products.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (30.2700, -83.3700)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1209657. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.