Flash Flood, Sussex
- When
- July 19, 1:30 PM EST to 4:30 PM EST
- Where
- Sussex County, Bethany Beach
- Reported by
- BROADCAST MEDIA
- Coordinates
- 38.683, -75.339 (the zone’s center; the record gives no point)
Flash Flood in Delaware, July 19, 2002
Very slow moving thunderstorms with very heavy rain inundated the Bethany Beach area of southeastern Sussex County with copious amounts of rain. Doppler Radar storm total estimates reached about 10 inches in Bethany Beach.
Where it happened
Every event with a place to put it; 1 filed by county or forecast zone are drawn at its center, in a lighter ring. Tap one for its entry below.
- Tornadoes
- Tropical storms and surge
- Floods
- Wind
- Hail
- Winter weather
- Heat and drought
- Cold
- Fire, smoke and dust
- Marine and coastal
- Other
The toll
- Deaths
- 0
- Injuries
- 0
- Property damage
- None recorded
- Crop damage
- None recorded
- Events
- 1
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
What happened
The episode as NWS PHI wrote it up.
Very slow moving thunderstorms with very heavy rain inundated the Bethany Beach area of southeastern Sussex County with copious amounts of rain. Doppler Radar storm total estimates reached about 10 inches in Bethany Beach. Two ground truth rainfall reports from Bethany Beach recorded 7.41 inches and 6.00 inches. Most of the rain fell between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. EDT. Every road east of Delaware State Route 1 was flooded. All side streets in Bethany Beach were flooded and closed. There was up to two feet of water in the downtown area. The Bethany Fire Department rescued occupants of two vehicles that were swept by the flood waters into ditches. They also rescued an elderly man and woman who drove their vehicle into a pond near the Sea Colony Resort. The intersection of Delaware State Route 1 and Jefferson Bridge Road became a pond. One driver floated into a ditch at this intersection. Residents were using rafts as a means of transportation along Pennsylvania Avenue. Emergency services responded to 13 weather related calls in the town. Even the fire department was not immune: the heavy rain flooded the first floor of the fire station, soaked the furniture and caused the carpeting to float. Thirty feet of an embankment along the Loop Canal was washed away. The flooding forced the cancellation of the evening town meeting. No serious injuries were reported.
What forecasters said that day
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Philadelphia/Mount Holly wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Jul 19, 10:05 AM EST, 3 hours 25 minutes earlier.
Area forecast discussion, Jul 19, 10:05 AM EST, 3 hours 25 minutes before
AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION...UPDATED NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MOUNT HOLLY NJ 1105 AM EDT FRI JUL 19 2002 HAVE UPDATED FCST TO...GO WITH VARIABLE CLOUDINESS THIS AFTN RATHER THAN MOSTLY CLOUDY BASED ON CURRENT CONDS AND SAT PIX. ALSO RAISED TEMPS AND HEAT INDICES A NOTCH MOST ZONES TO REFLECT ADDED HEATING FROM THE ADDITIONAL SS. REST OF FCST LOOKS GOOD FOR NOW WITH SHWRS/TSTMS EXPECTED TO DEVELOP THIS AFTN AND EVNG... MORE LIKELY NRN ZONES. RPW ------------------------------------------------------------------- PREVIOUS DISC... NOT MUCH RELIEF EARLY THIS MORNING IN THE BIG CITY AS TEMPS REMAIN AROUND 80 DEGREES...70S JUST ABOUT EVERYWHERE ELSE. WITH LITTLE RELIEF DURING THE RECENT OVERNIGHTS...SEVERAL CONSECUTIVE DAYS IN THE 90S...AND PROBABLY THE HIGHEST DEWPOINTS DURING THIS RUN...HAVE CHOSEN TO KEEP THE HEAT WARNING GOING EVEN THOUGH DB TEMPS SHOULD DROP A FEW DEGREES TODAY. 92/73 PUTS THE HI AT 100 DEGREES. FAVOR FWC/MAV NUMBERS. MODELS HAVE HAD DIFFICULTY THE LAST SEVERAL DAYS WITH PRECIPITATION. RIGHTLY SO WITH THE LACK OF TRIGGERING MECHANISMS. COLD FRONT TO THE NORTH IS FORECAST TO DRIFT SOUTH TODAY. THIS SHOULD ACT AS A FOCUS FOR MOIST CONVECTION TODAY. POPS WILL BE HIGHEST ACROSS THE NRN ZONES. AFTER COORDINATION WITH AKQ WILL DROP THE LIKELY POPS WE HAD GOING ACROSS THE SRN ZONES INTO THE CHANCE CATEGORY. PW/S REMAIN HIGH...AS DOES FLASH FLOOD GUIDANCE DUE TO THE RECENT DRY WEATHER. STILL CAN/T RULE OUT LOCALIZED FLOODING THOUGH. THIS A GREATER THREAT THAN ORGANIZED SEVERE. WILL KEEP POPS IN THE EVENING TONIGHT ACROSS THE SOUTH AND PAST MIDNIGHT ACROSS THE NORTH WITH THE BOUNDARY IN THIS VICINITY. CAN/T RULE OUT MOIST CONVECTION TOMORROW AFTERNOON AS LOW LEVEL MOISTURE WILL STILL BE PRESENT AND ETA WIND FIELDS SUGGEST THE SAME DECAYING BOUNDARY HANGING AROUND. AN IMPEDING FACTOR AND DIFFERENT FROM TODAY...THE H5 TROF AXIS WILL SHIFT EAST TOMORROW PUTTING US IN A NW FLOW. HAVE THROWN IN 20 POPS. TEMPS SHOULD BE SEVERAL DEGREES COOLER. THUS DO NOT FAVOR THE ETA MOS GUIDANCE. TOOK OUT THE PRECIP SUNDAY NIGHT AS WESTERN ATLANTIC HIGH PRESSURE WILL REMAIN ENTRENCHED. WILL LEAVE PRECIP IN FOR MONDAY...BUT WOULD NOT BE AT ALL SURPRISED TO SEE A DRY START TO THE NEXT WORK WEEK. MARINE REMAINS QUIET. .PHI... DE...EXCESSIVE HEAT WARNING TODAY FOR ZONE DEZ001. MD...NONE. NJ...EXCESSIVE HEAT WARNING TODAY FOR ZONES NJZ015...NJZ017>019. PA...EXCESSIVE HEAT WARNING TODAY FOR ZONES PAZ067>071. MARINE...NONE.
In the hours before
Special weather statement, Jul 19, 12:59 PM EST, 31 minutes before
DEZ003-004-192100- SPECIAL WEATHER STATEMENT - VERY HEAVY RAIN NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MOUNT HOLLY NJ 159 PM EDT FRI JUL 19 2002 ...HEAVY RAIN OVER COASTAL SUSSEX COUNTY DELAWARE... ...INTENSE LIGHTNING WITH THIS STORM... A SERIES OF THUNDERSTORMS HAVE FORMED OVER THE DELAWARE BEACHES AND ARE MOVING VERY SLOWLY. RADAR INDICATES THAT AS MUCH AS 3 INCHES OF RAIN HAS FALLEN IN THE PAST HOUR. IF THESE STORMS DONT MOVE INTO THE NEARSHORE WATERS SEVERAL MORE INCHES OF RAIN COULD FALL FLOODING SOME OF THE ROADWAYS. FREQUENT LIGHTNING WAS ALSO OBSERVED WITH THIS STORMS. EBERWINE
The radar
The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
Event by event
1 flash flood. Local standard time, as filed.
What these are
- Flash Flood
- Flooding that begins within six hours of the rain that causes it, or of a dam or levee failure or ice jam release, often with deadly speed.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
The same day elsewhere
- Flash Flooding in West Virginia, July 19, 2002
- Lightning Strike in Delaware, July 19, 2002
- Lightning Strike in New York, July 19, 2002
- Flash Flood in Indiana, July 19, 2002
- Hail and Damaging Wind in Massachusetts, July 19, 2002
- Flash Flooding and Damaging Wind in Ohio, July 19, 2002
- Hail and Damaging Winds in Ohio, July 19, 2002
- Damaging Winds in Georgia, July 19, 2002
- Lightning Strike in New Jersey, July 19, 2002
- Hail and Damaging Winds in Kansas, July 19, 2002
- Damaging Wind and Lightning Strike in Alabama, July 19, 2002
- Flooding and Damaging Winds in Ohio, July 19, 2002
More
Every storm in Delaware in 2002Every state in 2002This day in weather historyWarnings in Delaware, July 2002
Sources
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 5308650.