Trump pledges '100 percent' support for storm-battered North Carolina

More than 1,000 roads were closed across the North Carolina on Tuesday, officials said, and about 343,000 people were still without power.

Officials say the van was traveling near the Little Pee Dee River, one of the bodies of water officials in SC are watching closely as water continues to poor into the state from upriver in North Carolina following the heavy rains of Florence.

Mayor Lawson Battle said that as far as he knew, everyone in the town of about 360 people evacuated as the water first started to invade town Monday.

Addressing roughly 10,000 people who remain in shelters and "countless more" staying elsewhere, Cooper urged them to stay put for now, particularly those from the hardest-hit coastal counties that include Wilmington, near where Florence blew ashore on Friday.

Authorities say two female inmates being transported to a mental health facility in SC drowned in rising flood waters after the van they were in was swept away.

With Hurricane Florence bearing down on the Carolinas, the president was focused on criticism of the federal response to the hurricane that battered Puerto Rico a year ago.

When storms such as Harvey, which struck Texas last year, and Florence come to a virtual stall, a deluge of rain can fall in the matter of days, equal to what an area typically sees in a year, they said.

And plenty of roads are still closed in the storm's wake.

A submerged vehicle sits surrounded by water outside a home in a flooded neighbourhood in Lumberton, North Carolina in the aftermath of Hurricane Florence.

CONWAY, SC - SEPTEMBER 17: Floodwaters from Hurricane Florence surround two homes on September 17, 2018, in Conway, South Carolina.

Sheehan said the company had reported the incident to state and federal regulators "out of an abundance of caution". Much of Lumberton, where the Lumber river flooded mostly lower-income housing, was still inaccessible.

The N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services says 3.4 million chickens and turkeys and 5,500 hogs were killed by Florence.

The city manager told CNN that 12,000 people are "in harm's way".

The river hit 61.4 feet early Wednesday morning.

Another 25 of the pits containing animal feces and urine have either suffered structural damage, had wastewater levels go over their tops from heavy rains or had been swamped by floodwaters.

Local authorities were keeping an eye on rivers that were expected to crest throughout the day Tuesday, in some cases exceeding the levels of Hurricane Matthew.

While handing out supplies to flood victims Tuesday, Governor Roy Cooper warned many roads remain "treacherous" and that flooding in some areas will only get worse.

North Carolina's farmers, meanwhile, are beginning to count up their losses.

The hurricane has claimed at least 32 lives, officials said, including 25 in North Carolina.

President Trump has arrived in flood-soaked North Carolina, where under sunny skies, he's getting a firsthand look at the devastation that has killed dozens of people and displaced many thousands from their homes across the Southeast.

In a subsequent settlement with federal regulators, Duke agreed to plead guilty to nine Clean Water Act violations and pay $102 million in fines and restitution for illegally discharging pollution from coal-ash dumps at five North Carolina power plants.