Rainstorms that moved into North Santa Rosa County but found themselves stuck there in the early morning hours of June 9 dropped an astonishing 10.06 inches of rain on areas in and around the town of Jay.
David Eversole, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Mobile, said a storm the magnitude of the Monday event is only expected to occur every 50 to 75 years, and most of the precipitation fell in a six hour span around 4 a.m.
Eversole said the isolated downpour, centered over a relatively small area as it was, was caused by the storm forming at a "boundary" separating a couple of divergent fronts. The hard rains came as a result of "a couple of impulses" which are disturbances in the atmosphere.
"There was just a stalled boundary along the Florida Panhandle and we had storms moving along it," Eversole said.
The extreme rainfall created flooding and forced the closure of several Santa Rosa County roads. The Jay Fire Department reported making two water rescues, answered calls to three trees blocking roadways, a tree fire and a structure fire in the Berrydale community.
Jay Town Manager Eric Seib reported flooding to approximately seven newly constructed homes on Shell Road west of Spring Street and on Godwin Road east of Spring Street. The homes were all built close to the road on long, thin lots, he said.
Flooding was also reported at Pam's Country Kitchen, where an employee was forced to kayak in to survey the damage.
County Commissioner and Jay resident Rhett Rowell said he woke Monday morning to find himself trapped by water and unable to leave home, a dreadful inconvenience on a scheduled board meeting day.
Rowell was able to escape and get to the meeting by accessing his mother's vehicle parked at her house down the street.
Rowell said that the rain left much of the area's farmland underwater on the morning of June 9 and that while farmers were confident the peanuts now in the ground are big enough to have escaped damage, the fear remains of continued rainfall.
Eversole said the Weather Service anticipates some precipitation every day for the rest of the week with calculations running in the 70 to 80% range.
A total of 10 roads were closed for some or all of the day June 9 with five of them remaining so at the end of the business. Those include Walling Road at Coldwater Creek, Highway 4 at Morristown Road, Highway 89 between Pine Level Church Road and Chumuckla Highway, Gordon Land Road at Coldwater Creek Recreation Area and Amos Cabanass Road in Munson closed at the Bridge across Juniper Creek Road.
County emergency officials warned drivers to use extreme caution, particularly on bridges as creeks and rivers were still rising due to water flowing in from north of the area.