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Rain falls in buckets, roads get flooded
By adamg on Fri, 07/21/2023 - 10:25pm
Custom House in the torrent. Photo by Matt Frank. See it larger.
Sarah Wroblewski reports Boston got nearly two inches of rain out of tonight's storm, more than local storm drains and roads could handle in a short amount of time. Some trees came down after being hit by lightning.
The National Weather Service issued a flash-flood warning for the Boston area and warned: Turn around, don't drown, move to higher ground, etc., to avoid the sort of flooding that happened near Chelsea High School, along Quincy Shore Drive and in the Rutherford Avenue underpass in Charlestown, which the city shut because of all the water.
Spring Street in front of the West Roxbury Star Market flooded, although it floods almost as much as Morrissey Boulevard in Dorchester, so nobody was surprised.
14 buildings at MIT flooded. So did the concourses at Fenway Park:
Suboptimal weather for a ballgame at lake Fenway @universalhub pic.twitter.com/1VHzPB8ZAK
— Josh Bittker (@jbittker) July 22, 2023
FYI: Local flooding on several Wellesley roads including Route 9. Some lightning strikes, including this tree on Schaller St. Officer Chris Fritts captured this video as Wellesley FD extinguished it. pic.twitter.com/4w5aVTlHLG
— Wellesley Police (@WellesleyPolice) July 22, 2023
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Comments
So yeah, the people driving through the water
in that Chelsea High School video?
Never do that.
Not just a good way to damage your car, but also a good chance of getting killed. You don't know what's under the water, including sinkholes. You also don't know how fast it's moving, and cars can float away in surprisingly little water.
As Adam quoted: "Turn around, don't drown."
I used to live on a street
I used to live on a street where the intersection would flood pretty bad. There were multiple other ways around it and most people would turn around and go up and around on the hillside... But there was always one bozo who would floor it and get stuck in the middle. It was made even worse when my father, uncle and neighbor would be out there in hip high waders trying to clear out the drains of debris and even though people tried to flag down the driver's to get them to wait , some would still drive right in causing waves and splashing them. Those were the drivers we found some joy in seeing stuck in the water (luckily it wasn't flowing and wasn't deep enough to kill anyone, just cause serious damage to the cars.) The guys would just keep clearing the drains as the angry man (it was always a man) would be on the side of the road cursing , everyone ignoring him.
There were even times where sedans would get stuck and then a pickup would blow in, not caring they were soaking the other car and they would get stuck too. It made for some solid entertainment for the little street I lived on. People just don't think before they act.
Yep, mostly just a good spectator sport
in spots like that, with no larger body of water. That first dawning moment of realization that cars aren't actually waterproof...
But near rivers... yikes. I've seen an SUV that tried to drive over a flooded bridge go floating away. Got hung up on a downed tree or something, luckily. I imagine they got out OK -- but that the vehicle was totaled.
I don't think a lot of people
I don't think a lot of people fully understand how much power flowing water has. It doesn't take that much to pick a car up and start dragging it
Yeah, exactly this!
Just the volume of water on the footprint of a Honda Civic, if 8 inches deep, already outweighs the car. If it wants to move, car ain't gonna stop it.
Flowing water is one of the most inexorably destructive forces on the planet.
So, no going in at beaches for another week
This summer's cycle of heavy downpours is overwhelming the sanitary systems back-to-back. I'd love to go swimming some muggy day, but not catching projectile diarrhea as a result.
Never change Spring Street…
I used to live in an apartment that was right where the street would flood. Always entertaining watching the cars attempt to go through… I vaguely remember one that didn’t really make it. And the MBTA(#36) bus, banging a U-ie to avoid the mess was just about as entertaining.
I sort of wonder if it was a flood-y when the railroad went through there a very long time ago…
Peace/out
No doubt
Looks like it was a big bowl back in the day as well.
But looks like the train from Dedham would make it through just fine - it's the trolleys that went down Spring to the parkway (where you can still see bits of the track on which they'd turn around next to Joe's 320 Cafe) that would have problems.
Ah HA!!
So those were trolley tracks! Makes sense now… thx!