Six passengers and a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority employee had to be rescued by boat on Tuesday after the historic streetcar they were riding ran into a “wall of water” near Milton, Mass.

At approximately 7:30 a.m., water from the Neponset River quickly began to flood the right-of-way of the Ashmont-Mattapan High Speed Line, a 2.6-mile transit line that serves the south side of Boston and connects with MBTA’s Red Line. The operator later told officials that the water came quickly and the trolley lost power soon after entering the flood waters. Members of the Milton, Mass., Fire Department were called in and deployed an inflatable boat to get the seven people on board to higher ground. MBTA suspended the streetcar service afterward and had buses operating between Mattapan and Ashmont. Regular streetcar service resumed later in the day. Officials said the flooding was caused by an ice dam.

The Mattapan Line is one of the last traditional streetcar lines in the country using PCCs and it’s also the only line to have never stopped using the iconic cars. —Justin Franz