[legion]

Blame the Sahara.

The town that I live in would be in the same trouble if we got 50+ inches of rain in the same amount of time. Being 1000+ miles from the coast, it seems less likely, but I'm sure it is possible for a non-Hurricane storm (or series of storms) could dump the same amount of rain.

Typically Hurricanes hit the coast, move inland, and dissipate. No one anticipated this one sitting half on land and half off, being able to recharge and dump rain for several days. We don't know how often this happens, but it hasn't happened before in the time we've had modern weather satellites.

I put this down to "an act of God". We had no reason to believe this would happen based on past experiences. Hindsight is 20/20, but I don't think anyone was acting collectively or individually irresponsibly.