OXFORD, Conn. — Parts of southwestern Connecticut were hit hit by severe flooding from as much as 10 inches (25.4 centimeters) of rain, and at least one person was confirmed dead, authorities said.
Scott Pellitier, fire chief in the community of Oxford, told the New Haven Register on Monday that crews recovered the body of a woman who disappeared during Sunday’s storm.
Crews were still looking for a second woman who washed away as firefighters tried to rescue her, he said.
Eighteen people were rescued from a restaurant in Oxford by firefighters who stretched a ladder across the floodwaters to reach them.
The water was “literally enveloping this whole restaurant,” Jeremy Rodorigo, a firefighter from the neighboring town of Beacon Falls, said Monday. “And we were worried about the structural integrity of the restaurant because there were literally cars floating by and large objects hitting the building.”
The firefighters first rescued a woman and a small dog from an apartment next to the restaurant and then extended the ladder to the restaurant, the Brookside Inn, Rodorigo said. All 18 people were rescued without injury, he said.
National Weather Service meteorologist James Tomasini said that storms dropped as much as 10 inches (25.4 centimeters) of rain on parts of Connecticut and that a second round hit Suffolk County on New York’s Long Island overnight.
The weather service declared a flash flood warning for parts of Fairfield, New Haven, Litchfield and Hartford counties, the state’s emergency management services said on the social platform X.
Weather officials say the flooding was unrelated to Hurricane Ernesto, which on Monday was over the open Atlantic Ocean but still expected to cause powerful swells, dangerous surf and rip currents along the U.S. East Coast.