Florence, South Carolina, Sep 17 (EFE).- The death toll left in the path of what began as Hurricane Florence along the southeastern coast of the United States increased to 18 with the death of a baby after a tree fell on the infant’s home, media reports said Monday.
The 3-month-old baby could not recover from the injuries suffered when a pine tree crashed onto the family’s mobile home Sunday afternoon, a commissioner of Gaston County in North Carolina said.
This was the second death of a baby caused by Florence – another died on Friday together with its mother when a tree fell on a home in Wilmington, a city near the area where Florence made landfall as a Category 1 hurricane with winds of up to 90 mph (150 kph).
On Sunday another three people died in separate highway accidents due to the bad weather and road conditions produced by Florence, local authorities said.
The hurricane, which has weakened to a tropical depression, is moving through the western region of the state of Virginia with winds of up to 30 mph (50 kph).
Florence is moving rapidly in a northeasterly direction and will bring intense rains Monday to New York state and New England.
At the same time its rainstorms will continue in North Carolina, northeastern South Carolina and West Virginia.
This will raise the water level of several rivers in the region that threaten to overflow their banks, which will again endanger area residents, authorities warned.
In its latest Florence bulletin, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said that flood warnings remain in force for a large part of the southeastern coast of the country.