Residents of a small Illinois city ordered to evacuate amid warnings that dam could burst during once-in-a-century rainfall
WSIL
By Chris Boyette and Sara Tonks, CNN
(CNN) — Evacuations have been ordered for residents of Nashville, Illinois, with county emergency officials warning the dam for the city’s reservoir could rupture at any moment.
“Attention the failure of the Nashville dam is imminent. Please evacuate your home at this time … you need evacuate now!” the Washington County Emergency Management Agency said in a hasty Facebook post Tuesday morning.
Washington County was under a flash flood warning as of 10 a.m. CT after the region received over 5 inches of rain in the past six hours, according to radar estimates from the National Weather Service office in St. Louis.
That level of rain approaches 100-year rainfall frequency – the type of downpour statistically likely to happen only once every century – according to weather records.
Extreme rainfall events like these are becoming more common, and they illustrate the effects of climate change. As the planet warms from fossil fuel pollution, the atmosphere is able to hold more moisture, which can then be released as intense rainfall.
Heavy rain was still falling in the area Tuesday morning. Another round of heavy precipitation is possible for the region overnight, after a potential break in the heaviest rain later Tuesday afternoon and evening.
Nashville – home to 3,105 people, according to the US Census Bureau – is located in southeast Illinois, about 50 miles east of St. Louis, Missouri.
On July 26, 2022, a secondary dam on the city reservoir was breached after over four inches of rain fell near Nashville in less than 12 hours, causing a six-foot breach and flooding nearly 40 acres of land between Ashley, Illinois, and Nashville, according to Washington County records.
CNN has reached out to officials in Nashville and Washington County for updates.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
CNN’s Eric Zerkel and CNN meteorologist Brandon Miller contributed to this report
The-CNN-Wire
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