Flood — Essex, Massachusetts

2010-03-14 to 2010-03-21 · near South Essex, Essex, Massachusetts

Event narrative

Several small streams rose above flood stage across Essex County, including the Ipswich River at Ipswich and South Middleton, the Shawsheen River at Andover, and the Parker River at Byfield. This river flooding, coupled with heavy rain and poor drainage flooding, resulted in a federal disaster declaration for seven counties in Massachusetts, including Essex County.

Numerous streets were closed and basements flooded in Peabody, Salem, Newbury, Haverhill, Topsfield, Andover, Gloucester, Newburyport, Byfield, Middleton, and Rowley, including Route 128 S in Peabody and Route 1 in Topsfield. Portions of Merrimack College in Andover were flooded, submerging trees downed by the wind. Several cars were stranded in floodwaters, including one in Saugus at the Shaws parking lot, three on Woburn Street in Andover, and two on Foster Street in Peabody. Several people were trapped in the cars in Peabody, but were successfully rescued. Many streets in downtown Peabody were under four feet of water. Collections at the Stevens Memorial Library in North Andover were damaged by floodwaters.

In Lawrence, a total of 50 homes on Willow Street, Exchange Street, and Myrtle Street were evacuated. In addition, twenty eight people in the Holiday Inn Express on Winthrop Street were evacuated due to flooding in the hotel. Approximately 25 three tenant homes along the Spicket River were evacuated. The Carriage Hill Apartments in Amesbury were evacuated due to flooding from a nearby pond. The Washington Park Condos and all 110 residents of the Marland Place Assisted Living Center in Andover were evacuated.

A 500 foot stretch of Route 62 in Danvers was closed when a fifteen foot deep sinkhole developed because of an underground culvert that was washed out after nearly eight inches of rain fell. It reopened nearly three weeks later after work was delayed by a second major rainstorm.

A sewer treatment plant in Gloucester processed roughly 15 million gallons of wastewater during the storm, nearly 5 times capacity. As a result, excess wastewater was combined with runoff and released into the harbor.

One fatality indirectly resulted from the flooding when a 49 year old man drowned while pumping water from his office. A 15 year old girl was hospitalized for hypothermia after spending 45 minutes in the Ipswich River when the canoe she was in capsized.

Wider weather episode

A stacked low pressure system (surface low and upper level low on top of each other) moved southeast of Nantucket, spreading rain across Southern New England. This resulted in widespread rainfall totals of three to six inches. In eastern Massachusetts, a strong southeasterly low level jet pumped ample moisture into the area, resulting in rainfall totals on the order of six to ten inches. This resulted in major flooding across eastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island, including small stream, urban, and poor drainage flooding. In addition, the Concord River at Lowell, the Shawsheen River at Wilimington, and the Pawtuxet River at Cranston reached record flood stages within two to four days of the rain. The Governor of Massachusetts declared a state of emergency and this was followed by a federal disaster declaration for seven Massachusetts counties.

Strong winds associated with the low pressure system and the low level jet affected both the east and south coasts, resulting in numerous downed trees and wires and some minor structural damage to a few buildings.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (42.6188, -70.7575)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 217598. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.