Storms Pound Pennsylvania, Maryland; 4 Die

HAGERSTOWN, Md. â€”  Three people apparently drowned and another was killed by lightning as flash floods and storms continued to plague Maryland and Pennsylvania.

On Wednesday, Orion James, 36, died in Baltimore after he was struck by lighting at a construction site. Karen D. Roman, 36, of Emmitsburg, Md., was swept from her car on a water-covered bridge and discovered a mile downstream, and the body of an unidentified man was found in the Patapsco River in Catonsville, Md.

On Tuesday night, 42-year-old Janice May Rhodes was killed in St. Thomas, Pa., when she drowned after she slipped off the hood of her car as rescuers tried to save her.

The deluge, which dumped up to 10 inches of rain in some areas, has caused evacuations, power outages and road closures.

“This thing has wiped us out. We need some kind of federal help or something,� said Henry Physioc of Hagerstown Spring Works Co., an automotive service firm that had water lapping more than 4 feet up its walls.

Hit hardest by the powerful thunderstorms were sections of southern Pennsylvania. Gettysburg was swamped by 10.7 inches of rain in about six hours, according to the National Weather Service.

Gettysburg Mayor Francis Linn issued a declaration of disaster emergency, and residents were advised to boil tap water because of flooded wells. A sewage treatment facility was also damaged.

The historic site in south-central Pennsylvania is where the Civil War turned and President Lincoln later delivered his famous Gettysburg Address.

Walter Powell, historic preservation officer for Gettysburg, where Union and Confederate forces clashed in July 1863, said there was no damage to the national park’s battlefield or to its historic cemetery.

An apartment complex was flooded, leaving 35 residents homeless, said a Red Cross spokeswoman. Dozens of other area residents also had to be evacuated.

A record 2.25 inches fell Tuesday in Pittsburgh, Pa., breaking the old daily record of 1.56 inches set in 1932. Erie, Pa., also received a record amount Tuesday with 4.65 inches, breaking the 1957 daily record of 2.8 inches.

Bucks County, Pa., just outside Philadelphia, was declared a federal disaster area Tuesday because of flooding.

Meanwhile, in North Carolina, residents were bracing for the first named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season.

Tropical Storm Arthur was edging closer to the state’s coast on a path that would take its center over the Outer Banks and Pamlico Sound, the National Hurricane Center said.

Maximum sustained winds were near 40 mph with higher gusts, making Arthur a minimal tropical storm. It appeared to be weakening and would probably be downgraded to a tropical depression, forecasters said.