The multi-day flood emergency gripping the central United States has widened substantially, with the National Weather Service carrying 80 active Flash Flood Warnings across 11 states on Monday — up from 73 warnings in seven states Sunday — as the threat extended sharply southward into Texas and Louisiana and new alerts emerged in Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, and Mississippi.
South Texas became the story’s new center of gravity. The National Weather Service in Corpus Christi issued warnings blanketing Deep South Texas, including Brooks, Cameron, Hidalgo, Willacy, Starr, Zapata, Jim Hogg, and Kenedy counties, with flooding from excessive rainfall expected to remain possible through Thursday morning. On the Rio Grande, the river at Laredo is forecast to reach minor flood stage, with the National Weather Service projecting elevated water levels from Tuesday morning through Thursday afternoon, directly affecting Webb County.
Southeast Texas saw active, ongoing flooding. Brazos, Burleson, and Washington counties carried warnings through mid-morning, with rivers, creeks, and streams at or near flood stage and numerous roads reported closed. Hardin and Jefferson counties were also under active alerts — part of the broader zone stretching toward the Houston weather area. Bexar and Wilson counties in Central Texas rounded out a significant Texas footprint. Calcasieu Parish in southwestern Louisiana remained under warning as the moisture corridor extended eastward along the Gulf Coast.
Missouri, the concentrated core of Sunday’s outbreak, remained under pressure. Already-saturated ground across more than a dozen counties continued to inhibit drainage even as fresh rainfall tapered, keeping rivers elevated and flood watches in effect.
The 11-state footprint now arcs from Washington state and Alaska in the northwest all the way through the Kansas and Illinois flatlands and down into the Mississippi Delta and Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast — a geographic scatter that reflects a diffuse, sprawling moisture pattern rather than a single coherent storm system. That complexity makes the outlook harder to pin down and means separate, overlapping flood threats will require monitoring independently.
The National Weather Service urges residents in all affected areas not to drive around barricades or through flooded roads. Observed flooding should be reported to local emergency services. With several warnings explicitly extending through Thursday, conditions across South Texas and the central Gulf Coast are not expected to improve quickly.
Residents and travelers throughout the affected corridor should continue monitoring updated National Weather Service forecasts as river gauges rise and warning boundaries shift.