Businesses in Annapolis prepare for potential flooding from Tropical Storm Debby (2024)

ANNAPOLIS, Md — Deb Nicholson knows the drill.

Working at Annapolis Marine Art Gallery at City Dock, she has the flood prep plan down to a science.

"We start with moving the art upstairs, especially the low stuff, taking everything off the floor, putting furniture up on blocks. Then we move to sandbags and tarps at the front door. If the water's going to be that high, sandbags are actually just a decoration," she told WMAR-2 News' Elizabeth Worthington.

That's been proven time and time again in this city - most recently this past January, when a big rainstorm rolled through and damaged most of the businesses on Dock Street.

"The carpet turned into a giant sponge so naturally that had to go. Now we have sort of the industrial chic look. All we have to do is mop, so we're all good," Nicholson said.

A few doors down, Bitty & Beau's coffee shop was closed until April after that winter storm.

"We had to redo all the walls, throw away some of the food and everything," shift manager Mady Quigley said.

This time they're not taking any chances.

"I'm gonna probably put the chairs up, move some food from the back of the counters, just to be extra safe because of what happened last time," Quigley said.

Staff at the Anne-Arundel County Office of Emergency Management have had a quieter summer, weather-wise. But they're ready for that work to pick back up, and they want everyone on the roads to be ready too.

"Flooding is especially hard to see at night so especially Thursday night into Friday, we're asking people to avoid driving if you can. That way you don't have to run into any flooded roadways that are harder to see," spokesperson Kasey Thomas told WMAR-2 News.

The office is prepared to set up a call center for road closures if necessary, and encourages people to call them to report downed trees, and BGE for power outages, instead of 911.

"I think everyone has a different definition of what an emergency situation is for them, and obviously if it's an emergency situation we want people to call 911. But if it's things like a tree is down, or a power outage, we have other resources that can maybe help take that pressure off of our 911 dispatchers," Thomas said.

In a press release, the City of Annapolis said: "The City is making preparations to deal with flooding, downed trees and potential power outages. If necessary, the Annapolis Department of Planning and Zoning will deploy damage assessment teams, and the Departments of Public Works and Recreation and Parks will mobilize “cut and toss” teams for debris removal. Cross-departmental collaboration for cleanup will be coordinated by the Annapolis Office of Emergency Management (OEM)."

A sandbag operation will open from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at City Dock on Thursday. Residents and business owners will be asked to show ID. There will be a limit of five sandbags for residents and 10 sandbags for businesses.

FEMA is already responding to severely impacted areas in the south, and says the slow-moving nature of the storm, and says people in Annapolis need to take the flooding threat seriously.

"While residents in Annapolis are certainly used to flooding as it happens routinely, I think what we have seen in a lot of the coastal communities that Debby is already impacting is that this is beyond your normal, routine, localized flooding," Jeremy Greenberg, director of FEMA's response operations division said.

Here's how he explained it:

"Because it’s such a slow-moving storm, moving at 5 mph, it’s dropping an immense amount of rain, sort of a flattened hurricane if you will, an immense amount of rain through multiple tide cycles. So you have that combination of the storm surge that you normally see in a hurricane, on top of all the rain, and then the rivers that normally can accept a fair amount of rain, now are getting it in a very short amount of time, a period of 12-24 hours. So you have the combination of three water sources, and where we normally see flood come in and then drain back out, the storm sitting off the coast is prohibiting that water from really going anywhere. So that’s where we’re seeing that long-standing, long duration flood hazard."

FEMA also says if you find yourself in need of shelter, you can text "SHELTER" and your zip code to "43362" to get a list of nearby shelter locations.

If you want to sign up for emergency notifications from the Anne-Arundel County Office of Emergency Management, click here.

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