{"id":327124,"date":"2026-08-22T01:34:42","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T01:34:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/327124\/"},"modified":"2026-08-22T01:34:42","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T01:34:42","slug":"rain-flooding-and-a-tornado-slam-queens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/327124\/","title":{"rendered":"Rain, flooding and a tornado slam Queens |"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thursday evening\u2019s storm dumped more than 2 inches of rain on some sections of Queens and brought a pair of rare tornadoes that touched down in the Rockaways and western Nassau County.<\/p>\n

The storm flooded major highways and led to massive and lengthy delays at John F. Kennedy International and LaGuardia airports.<\/p>\n

Figures obtained from the National Weather Service reported 2.25 inches of rain at LaGuardia and in Kew Gardens Hills, with 2.2 inches in Bellerose and 2.1 in Ozone Park.<\/p>\n

Other readings in Queens included Long Island City (1.63), Middle Village (1.51) Beechhurst (1.49), and JFK (1.12).<\/p>\n

Social media post from throughout Queens showed highways and major streets flooded.<\/p>\n

Both tornadoes started as water spouts and came ashore at about 6:30 and 7 p.m.. respectively.<\/p>\n

Published reports say the Nassau County tornado caused extensive structural damage in the Atlantic Beach area, though there were no reports of injuries.<\/p>\n

No injuries in the Rockaways were reported by Emergency Management personnel in a Friday afternoon email.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are assessing damage and asking New Yorkers to visit reportdamage.nyc.gov<\/a> if your home, business, or property was damaged during yesterday\u2019s storm,\u201d an agency spokesperson said. \u201cDamage reports help assess storm impacts and will determine whether the City is eligible to apply for federal assistance.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said New Yorkers can also request city services by visiting nyc.gov\/311<\/a> or by calling 311.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For Maryann Maragioglio of Woodhaven,\u00a0 the storm and the flooding of her 48th Street home was not a surprise.<\/p>\n

The last time it happened in July.<\/p>\n

The first time?<\/p>\n

\u201cMayor [Ed] Koch came and spoke with my father,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She said it doesn\u2019t have to be Hurricane Sandy from 2012 or the remnants of Hurricane Ida in 2021 to be a problem.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny time there is a heavy rain, the manhole covers blow up,\u201d Maragioglio said. \u201cIn July I had 15 feet of water in my house. I lost everything. You have open electric outlets and the water covers the outlets.\u2019<\/p>\n

She was just able to grab her dog and a few belongings and rush up to the second floor.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Thursday] wasn\u2019t as bad, But I got my whole basement, yard and garage flooded. I\u2019m still pumping out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis has to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Maragioglio blames the diversion of water from the nearby Long Island Expressway, Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and Laurel Hill Road.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re downhill,\u201d she said. \u201cThey divert the water and it comes down here.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also blames residential construction nearby in recent years for exacerbating the problem, and fears it will get worse with any new housing.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re going to build 60 apartments and connect them to these sewer lines?\u201d she asked. \u201cIt\u2019s ridiculous.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thursday evening\u2019s storm dumped more than 2 inches of rain on some sections of Queens and brought a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":327125,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[29551,14740,14236,609,19262,58525,774,534,9,24,102044,63,122,124,123,133],"class_list":["post-327124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-brooklyn-queens-expressway","tag-ed-koch","tag-flooding","tag-government","tag-kew-gardens-hills","tag-long-island-expressway","tag-nassau-county","tag-national-weather-service","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-emergency-management","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-weather"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=327124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327124\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/327125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}