Search Underway For Children Swept Away In North Carolina Flood

Rescuers were able to pull a woman and one of her two children into their boat after receiving a call for help overnight, but lost the child when the boat capsized. WRAL's Bryan Mims reports.

SMITHFIELD, N.C. (NBC News) — More than 17 hours after floodwaters washed away a car in Smithfield, North Carolina crews were still searching for two missing children Tuesday.

After 11:30 p.m. Monday, a woman called 911 and said her car was swept off the road and into a creek by floodwaters near West Smithfield Elementary School.

The woman was rescued and the car was recovered at about 8:30 a.m., but a 4-year-old and a 5-year-old were still missing.

Smithfield Fire Chief John Blanton said, initially, four rescue boats responded to rescue the family and all four capsized. All the rescuers fell into the water and were rescued, along with the woman.

“The amount of water and the current is so strong, it overcomes you when you start to turn a boat, and you’re in debris and tress and such, so they were fighting against that as well, so they they’d hit a tree, they’d flip over. That’s basically what they were in last night,” explained Blanton.

First responders held onto the mother, but the child slipped away. They found the woman’s white sedan a short distance downstream. Nobody was inside.

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