nashville received 14" (that's an average, some places got 18" some got 12") of rain in about 36 - 48 hours.
on Saturday May 1st, south nashville (mainly the suburbs) really got hit hard. however, the first day of rain started making it's way north to the city via the creeks and rivers.
on Saturday evening, city officials were recommended people stay home. the rain broke for a few hours Saturday night from about 6pm - 10pm. it promply resumed and rained all night.
by Sunday morning, Bellvue (straight west of the city) and Old Hickory (south east of the city) had begun to flood. the rain moved north all Sunday, and city itself took a pretty bad beating. the previous day's rain still had not drained out. by mid Sunday, the news was filled with boat rescues, emergency evacuations and a home floating down I-24. every image on the news was just muddy water flowing like mad through everywhere. by early evening the biggest concern was that the Cumberland river would peak. this river runs directly through down town. it generally sits at about 36', flood stage is mid 40's and it peaks around 48'. Late Sunday night, the Cumberland peaked up to 52' pouring water into the Titans stadium, and downtown nashville. up until that point, the flooding was mostly isolated to residential areas (which is pretty bad....). the country music hall of fame reported 6' of water, Titans stadium report 10', the list goes on and on. people lost homes, businesses, everything. flood insurance is not a standard item around here, so a lot of people have truly lost everything. i have friends that were sitting on their roof waiting for a boat to come. i have friends that lost their studios.....the list goes on and on.
i spoke with a FEMA worker a few nights ago, he said they are seeing area worse then Katrina here. i was really surprised by that. i drove through downtown the tuesday after the flooding. 4th street forward was blocked off. turning south on 4th street i saw building after building pumping water out.....
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