Survivors sought in Appalachian flooding
KEYSTONE, W.Va. (AP) – Streams began receding Saturday in the ravaged central Appalachians as rescue workers searched the hills and valleys for more victims of devastating floods that killed at least six people. Amid light rain, recovery crews worked to reopen roads blocked by mud, boulders and washouts in the region that encompasses parts of southern West Virginia, western Virginia and eastern Kentucky.
“All we’ve got is water and mud now. That’s it,” Cathy Hall said in Hurley, Va., weeping softly as she stood in a foot of soupy mud outside the Grundy National Bank branch office where she worked.
Tinnie Gravely, 35, of Welch, took her four young children to a shelter and expressed fear for her town’s recovery.
“It would be a miracle,” Gravely said. “Everything’s gone. It’s a ghost town.”
Torrents of water from a drenching storm poured down steep mountainsides and overflowed from streams and rivers winding through narrow valleys in the three states on Thursday and Friday.
The death roll rose Saturday when a tree loosened by the flooding crashed down a hill along U.S. 52 onto a sports utility vehicle, killing one of two adults inside.
Three children scrambled out the back with minor injuries.
A few hundred feet away, trees on the hillside creaked audibly.
The vehicle was registered to a couple who had been living in emergency housing since they were left homeless by last July’s record flooding, the Rev. Hilda Kennedy said tearfully at the accident site.
“They were sleeping with rats before we got them to New Hope Village (housing),” said Kennedy, program director of the Highland Educational Project in Keystone.
Kennedy said she feared McDowell County may have difficulty recovering from the flood so soon after last year’s devastation. The July flood and other heavy rains last spring were blamed for at least six deaths in West Virginia alone.
“There’s not enough money in the state of West Virginia to repair it this time,” Kennedy said.
Many residents have accused the timber and coal industries of worsening the flood threat by stripping the land.
“We pay the price,” Tony Bailey said.
A study commissioned by West Virginia Gov. Bob Wise of the industries’ roles in last summer’s flood is due to be completed by July.
Saturday’s deaths brought the toll to six, including one man killed in Virginia. Robert C. Snellenberger, 37, drowned after he lost his grip on a fence in the powerful current of Knox Creek at Hurley, Va.
Bob Adkins saw Snellenberger clinging to the fence.
“I was screaming, ‘Swim to the mountain!”‘ Adkins said Saturday, his eyes bloodshot from fatigue. “Once you get there, I figured he could find a tree or something to hold onto.”
Snellenberger swam to a nearby house and grabbed twice for the roof before disappearing. His body was found about 100 yards away.
Another man from Hurley was still missing, as was one person in Kentucky and seven in West Virginia.
“The mud is so thick you stand there in horror, wondering what to do, where to start,” said Edna Drake, a deputy clerk with the Pike County, Ky., sheriff’s department.
Wise had said after touring the area by helicopter and on foot Friday that hundreds of people were homeless and at least 375 homes and 30 businesses were damaged.
“We’re going to see a lot of digging out for a long time to come,” said Wise, who authorized the National Guard to activate 700 soldiers.
At Hurley, at least 100 homes were damaged by a flash flood that struck Thursday.
Boulders up to 4 feet high were strewn over streets and, in one instance, perched neatly in the garage of a home.
“It was like an explosion,” Sharon Stacy, 41, said of the deluge.
As many as 25 people were stranded on rooftops at Hurley and had to be rescued by helicopter, said State Police Sgt. M.F. McMurray. Some people tied themselves to trees to avoid being swept away.