Flood | featured news

Mississippi state officials expect to evacuate 2,000 to 5,000 people in coming days. In Louisiana, more spill gates are opened to divert floodwater.

The swollen Mississippi River rolled south Wednesday as communities along its delta braced for flooding, and vast farms remained under threat as it left a trail of submerged homes.

Officials are warning residents in low-lying areas to leave, as the Mississippi River approached a crest Monday.

Memphis area residents were warned on Saturday that they should not be fooled by sunny skies because the Mississippi River was gradually starting to "wrap its arms" around the city and rise to record levels.

Authorities ordered more evacuations near the Mississippi and Ohio rivers as flood waters continued to surge early Friday, drenching farmlands, highways and homes.

An engorged Mississippi river spilled out onto huge swaths of farmland in the American South and Midwest on Wednesday, prompting massive flooding from Minnesota to Louisiana.

A tornado destroyed 50 to 80 houses and killed at least one person in an Arkansas town on Monday, while a warning of imminent failure for a levee on the Black River in southeast Missouri prompted the mandatory evacuation of about 1,000 people.

Authorities in Kentucky were searching Thursday night for four children from an Amish family who were swept away in a creek swollen by storm waters, state police said.

It was like a tsunami from the sky in Brazil's Rio de Janeiro state as flood water gushed through hill towns and giant boulders catapulted from hillsides instantly crushing cars and houses.

Floods left parts of Australia's third-biggest city on Thursday looking like a war zone in need of years of reconstruction, the state premier said, while fresh threats loomed with a cyclone forecast offshore.