Hurricane Joaquin batters Bahamas as U.S. braces for 'historic' floods

Hurricane Joaquin — a Category 4 storm — battered the Bahamas Thursday as the U.S. braced for historic floods from another weather system.

Regardless of what Joaquin does, an equal concern in the U.S. is a "historic, potentially life-threatening rainfall event expected this weekend" in the Southeast from a separate system, the National Weather Service said.

States along the East Coast are bracing for the worst, whether from Joaquin or the massive rainfall. New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina all declared states of emergency ahead of the predicted bad weather.

A direct hit from Joaquin on the U.S. now seems unlikely, the National Hurricane Center said late Thursday night. Most of the forecast models were in agreement on a track farther away from the East Coast, the center reported. "The threat of direct impacts from Joaquin in the Carolinas and mid-Atlantic states appears to be decreasing."

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Ahead of the storm, heavy rains from a stalled front were already soaking much of the eastern U.S. on Thursday, the weather service said. One person died Thursday morning in Spartanburg, S.C., after several cars were submerged in floodwaters underneath a bridge, the Weather Channel reported.

The rains "are likely to continue for the next few days, even if the center of Joaquin stays offshore," the weather service said.

Parts of the Carolinas could see more than a foot of rain this weekend. There is a "potential for catastrophic flooding," the weather service in Greenville, S.C., said. Flood watches were posted in the Carolinas and in Virginia.

Joaquin, with maximum sustained winds at 130 mph Thursday night, lashed the central Bahamas with winds that extended as far as 45 miles from the eye, the hurricane center in Miami reported.

There was major flooding Thursday in the Bahamas,The Tribune newspaper in Nassau reported. Rising waters trapped residents Inside their homes in the southern Bahamas, the paper said.

As of 1 a.m. ET Friday, the center of the storm was about 20 miles southeast of the Clarence Town, Bahamas, and moving west at 3 mph. It is forecast to turn toward the north and an increase in forward speed Friday, according to the hurricane center.

Joaquin was expected to bring total rain accumulations of 12 to 18 inches over the central Bahamas, with isolated maximum amounts of 25 inches possible.