Flood — Pointe Coupee, Louisiana

2016-08-13 to 2016-08-15 · near New Roads Arpt, Pointe Coupee, Louisiana

Event narrative

Ten to fourteen inches of rain fell over a two day period across Pointe Coupee Parish. This rain led to flash flooding across the parish, details of which are included in the flash flood entry for the parish. As the water drained into lower lying areas, flooding began on the north side of New Roads, prompting evacuations. By Sunday, water began rising in the False River area, and numerous homes started flooding. In all, approximately 300 homes suffered varying degrees of flood damage due to the flooding and flash flooding across the parish. The majority of the flooded homes were in the False River area as record water levels were recorded. The others were spread throughout the parish and it is difficult to determine how many were damaged by the initial flash flooding and how many were damaged by the subsequent areal flooding as the water drained into the lower lying areas.

Wider weather episode

A slow moving low pressure system brought widespread showers and thunderstorms to the area. The system tapped into deep tropical moisture resulting in very intense rainfall across a large portion of the area. Two-day rainfall totals of 10 inches or more were common across areas generally to the west and northwest of Lakes Pontchartrain and Maurepas. The heaviest rainfall occurred across a swath of East Baton Rouge, Livingston, and St. Helena Parishes, where 20 to 30 inches fell over a 48-hour period, topping the 0.1% annual exceedance probability. The heavy rainfall led to widespread flash flooding and record river flooding. Many of the broken records had been set during the flooding of April 1983. In total, 12 people died in southeast Louisiana as a result of the flooding. The event was also responsible for an estimated total of ten billion dollars in damage across southern Louisiana and southern Mississippi. This estimate includes impacts of both the initial flash flooding and the resultant river flooding.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (30.7310, -91.4900)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 656893. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.