Zion hiker lost, Dallas cars submerged as floods hit US

An Arizona woman was still missing Monday after being swept away at Utah's Zion National Park three days earlier as flooding surged through the southwestern United States and imperiled tourists visiting the region’s scenic parks.

Farther east, heavy rains pummeled the Dallas-Fort Worth area on Monday, causing streets to flood and submerging vehicles as officials warned motorists to stay off the roads.

Park rangers at Zion National Park had not provided any additional updates as of Monday morning regarding the search for Jetal Agnihotri, a 29-year-old from Tucson, Arizona, whose brother told a local television station she could not swim.

Agnihotri was among a group of hikers who were swept away by floodwaters rushing through a popular hiking location in one of the park's many slot canyons. All of the hikers except Agnihotri were found on high ground and were rescued after water levels receded.

Elsewhere in the region, businesses and trails remained closed in the town of Moab, Utah which was overwhelmed with floodwaters over the weekend. Nearly 200 hikers had to be rescued in New Mexico, where flooded roads left them stranded in Carlsbad Caverns National Park.

Though much of the region remains in a decades-long drought, climate change has made weather patterns more variable and left soils drier and less absorbent, creating conditions more prone to floods and monsoons.

Flooding has swept parts of southern Utah in and around Moab and Zion throughout the summer, causing streams of water to cascade down from the region's red rock cliffs and spill out from the sides of riverbanks.

Zion is known for dangerous flash flooding that can suddenly trap people in slot canyons that fill up quickly and surprise tourists, including The Narrows, where Agnihotri found herself trapped....