OMAHA- Flash flooding washed through basement apartments, swept up cars and heaved pavement in low-lying areas of the Omaha metro area over the weekend.

Cleanup on Sunday was tedious, muddy work, but most people were counting their blessings.

Seven people had escaped with their lives after floodwaters trapped them in two elevators in the basement of the Old Market Loft apartments, 1011 Jones St.

Tony Luu, one of those who had been trapped, said he had no idea how dangerous flash flooding could be.

“I wouldn’t have stepped in the elevator if I had known,” he said, “Now I know to use a bit more caution.”

Alex Speakar was likewise awed by the power of the water that lifted up her car and carried it down Jones Street to rest against other vehicles.

“When they say how fast (flooding) comes in, it just didn’t register,” she said. The 22-year-old had packed all her possessions in her car in front of the Old Market Lofts for her planned return to the University of Kansas on Sunday. Instead, she spent the afternoon watching her uncle, a mechanic, hook it to his truck for the trip to Lawrence, Kansas.

“It could have been worse,” Speakar said. She still had a car — she hoped— and not everything in the car got soaked.

But dozens of motorists were caught in street flooding and required rescuing. Parked vehicles that had been pushed together by rushing water remained in place Sunday morning.

No injuries or deaths from the flooding were reported.

“We’re very, very lucky,” said Becky Kern, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Valley. Flooding and heat waves are the two deadliest forms of weather, Kern said.

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