Heavy rain and flash flooding in the Chattanooga area killed three people and left one person missing after 6.42 inches of rain fell on Tuesday, the second-highest single-day total in the city’s records dating to 1879, according to the National Weather Service. Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp declared a local state of emergency late Tuesday as creeks overflowed and streets turned into rivers. The fatalities occurred shortly after midnight on Wednesday in East Ridge, a Chattanooga suburb, when saturated ground caused a large tree to topple onto a car, killing a mother, father and their child, the Hamilton County Office of Emergency Management and Homeland Security said. Separately, first responders saw a man being swept away while walking through floodwaters; the search for him continued on Wednesday. Flooding shut down sections of Interstate 24, submerged homes and stranded vehicles across Hamilton County. Chattanooga Fire Department crews carried out swift-water rescues, including pulling six people from a van caught in an overflowing creek, while deputies evacuated residents from three inundated houses. Across the state line in Catoosa County, Georgia, authorities reported more than 100 evacuations and dozens of rescues at two apartment complexes. Although waters have begun to recede and I-24 has reopened, a flood watch remains in effect for much of middle Tennessee through Wednesday night, with the Weather Service warning that additional heavy downpours over saturated ground could trigger new flash floods.