An 11-year-old boy died Monday after he was swept into an Arkansas storm drain by floodwaters, authorities said.
The boy was playing near a retention pond, where water gathers during heavy rain, when he fell in, Bentonville Deputy Fire Chief Kevin Boydston said. The current swept the boy away. He has not been publicly identified.
A 47-year-old woman jumped in after the boy and was also swept away, Boydston said. The boy and the woman were rescued, but the boy died at the hospital. The woman was hospitalized.
Slow-moving thunderstorms brought heavy rainfall to the middle of the country Monday and caused localized flash flooding, the National Weather Service said.
“Those heavy rains, when they fell, a lot of them fell really quickly and in a short time,” said meteorologist Brad McGavock with the National Weather Service in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which covers parts of Arkansas. “Water management through those storm drains can really lead to a big volume of water through those culverts.”
In Michigan, a 14-year-old girl who thought she was reaching for a stick in her backyard ended up grabbing a fallen electrical line and was electrocuted. A woman in Ohio was fatally crushed by a downed tree.
