Flooded East braces for more rain

BOSTON – Nervous residents along the sodden East Coast watched rivers rise Monday as they braced for a new round of flooding – and the wettest March on record in some areas.

The National Weather Service posted flood warnings and advisories from Maine to the Carolinas as forecasts called for as much as 5 to 7 inches of rain over the next three days. The storm threatened to push already swollen rivers over their banks and add to the misery of homeowners still struggling to bail out flooded basements from other recent storms in the Northeast.

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick declared a state of emergency Monday and mobilized as many as 1,000 National Guardsmen to assist in the event of major flooding.

Meteorologists warned of a possible “life-threatening” situation along the Pawtuxet River in Rhode Island, which reached flood stage Monday night, with heavy flooding by this afternoon.

The storm hit as the Northeast continued to recover from a storm March 13-15 that dropped as much as 10 inches of rain, causing several rivers to rise and flooding basements throughout the region.

The rainiest March on record in Boston was 1953, when 11 inches fell during the month; nearly 10 inches had already fallen before the start of the latest storm.

New York City was within 3 inches of the March record of 10.54 inches set in 1983.