Flash floods kill 46 in US northeast

Flash flooding caused by the remnants of Hurricane Ida had killed at least 46 people in four northeastern US states as of Thursday night local time, including several who perished in basements during the "historic" weather event officials blamed on climate change.

Record rainfall, which prompted an unprecedented flash flood emergency warning for New York City, turned streets into rivers and shut down subway services as water cascaded down platforms onto tracks.

"I'm 50 years old and I've never seen that much rain ever," said Metodija Mihajlov, whose basement of his Manhattan restaurant was flooded with at least 7 centimeters of water.

"It was like living in the jungle, like tropical rain. Unbelievable. Everything is so strange this year," he said.

Hundreds of flights were canceled at the city's LaGuardia and John F. Kennedy airports, as well as at Newark in New Jersey, where video showed a terminal inundated by rainwater.

Ida was the fifth-most powerful storm to strike the US when it hit Louisiana on Sunday with maximum winds of 240 kilometers per hour, likely causing tens of billions of dollars in flood, wind and other damage, including to the electrical grid. The storm's remnants dropped devastating rainfall across parts of Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York and New Jersey on Wednesday, causing significant disruption to major population centers.

US President Joe Biden declared emergencies in the states of New York and New Jersey on Thursday, ordering federal disaster management agencies to coordinate relief efforts and provide support.

Ahead of a visit to Louisiana, where Ida earlier destroyed buildings and left more than a million homes without power, Biden said:"We're all in this together. The nation is ready to help."

'Caught in their vehicles'

Flooding closed major roads across New Jersey and New York boroughs including Manhattan, the Bronx and Queens, submerging cars and forcing the fire department to rescue hundreds of people.

At least 23 people died in New Jersey, Governor Phil Murphy told reporters.

"The majority of these deaths were individuals who got caught in their vehicles," he said.

Thirteen died in New York City, including 11 who could not escape their basements, police said. The victims ranged in age from two to 86.

"Among the people MOST at risk during flash floods here are those living in off-the-books basement dwellings that don't meet the safety codes necessary to save lives," lawmaker Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. "These are working class, immigrant, and low-income people& families."

The National Weather Service recorded 80 millimeters of rain in Central Park in just an hour－beating a record set just last month during Storm Henri.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Wednesday: "We're enduring a historic weather event tonight with record-breaking rain across the city, brutal flooding and dangerous conditions on our roads."

By Thursday evening, around 38,000 homes in Pennsylvania, 24,000 in New Jersey and 12,000 in New York were without power, according to the website Power-Outage, a significant decrease from earlier in the day.

It is rare for such storms to strike the US' northeastern seaboard and comes as the surface layer of oceans warms due to climate change.

The warming is causing cyclones to become more powerful and carry more water, posing an increasing threat to the world's coastal communities, scientists say.

"Global warming is upon us and it's going to get worse and worse and worse unless we do something about it," Democratic senator Chuck Schumer said.

Agencies and Minlu Zhang in New York contributed to this story.