Flash floods kill 16 in Arkansas

FLASH FLOODS swept through campsites in an Arkansas national forest yesterday, killing at least 16 people, police said, as a massive rescue operation was launched in the rugged mountainous area.

Helicopters scoured campgrounds along the Caddo and Little Missouri Rivers in search of survivors after rivers rose by six meters overnight following heavy rain. Earlier information indicating 12 people were killed was later updated to 16 dead, according to state police spokesman Bill Sadler, who was unable to provide details on the fatalities. “The primary mission is to get the living out of there that have been trapped,” he said earlier.

Officials brought a refrigerated truck to the forest to act as a temporary morgue.

Sadler said it wasn’t clear yet whether the dead were locals or visitors to the Ouachita National Forest, which sprawls over 1.8 million acres (700,000 hectares) of western Arkansas and southeastern Oklahoma.

The National Weather Service said the flash floods dumped up to seven inches (18 centimeters) of rainfall overnight, causing the Caddo and Little Missouri River to rise about 20 feet (six meters). “The Little Missouri River crested about 5:30am and the Caddo about 8:00am,” said Tabitha Clarke, a hydrologist with the National Weather Service in Little Rock, Arkansas.

“They probably had no warning,” that the water was coming, Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe told reporters early on Friday.

Some 30 people have been rescued so far, according to the Arkansas Department of Emergency Management, but the rugged and remote terrain and a lack of communications infrastructure is complicating the job.

For one, officials don’t know how many campers were in the area because many set up base at scattered sites in the remote hiking area.

“It’s not a regular campground where you check in,” said Sadler. “We’re even having difficulty with our radio communications and moving toward satellite hookups right now. So it will be a while before we have reliable communications in that area.”

Beebe said it was “a very rapid flash flood that inundated that area” and that there could have been as many as 300 people in the vicinity, according to the Red Cross.

He said rescue crews “are in the process of trying to determine if there are other people missing and they’re in heavy search and rescue mode now with national guard, state police, park and tourism people as well as law enforcement, emergency management personnel”.

Beebe said the search was being conducted with helicopters, horses, trucks and other equipment.