The Register-Herald, Beckley, West Virginia

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May 10, 2009

Wyoming bears brunt

Rain wreaks havoc

By Mary Catherine Brooks

Floodwaters raged through Wyoming County Saturday, forcing people to higher ground, blocking major roadways, damaging numerous homes and canceling Mullens’ annual spring celebration, the Dogwood Festival.

“It would be easier to tell you which areas aren’t flooded,” Dean Meadows, county emergency services director, said.

“In Hanover, we’ve got reports of people fleeing to the mountains and the water is still coming up,” Meadows said Saturday morning.

Some residents took refuge on the tops of structures, while others ran for higher ground.

One Hanover resident reported a mobile home floating by his own home. The mobile home is known to have housed an elderly couple, Meadows said. The fate of the elderly couple was not known Saturday evening.

“We are assuming they are OK,” Meadows said, because there was no report to the contrary from emergency crews working in the area.

Meadows had specialized rescue teams from Logan ready to move into the Hanover area to pull people to safety, but high water kept the area closed off. The local fire department continued its efforts in the area, he explained.

Reports indicated at least 50 homes had water inside living quarters in Hanover.

The Brenton Fire Department had a foot of water inside the building, Meadows said.

Several Brenton area homes were reported to have been flooded as well, according to officials.

“It’s not another 2001 for most of the county, but it is Hanover and Brenton’s 2001,” Meadows said.

On July 8, 2001, Wyoming County suffered what was at the time the worst natural disaster in West Virginia history, with only two communities in the county spared the destruction.

On Saturday, all major roadways were blocked for most of the day.

Both Mullens and Pineville were cut off by floodwaters, as were Rock View and Brenton.

Meadows said downtown Mullens had floodwaters, but he had no reports of water inside structures as yet.

By 4 p.m., the waters had begun to recede, Meadows said.

However, the intersection of W.Va. 97 and 971 was still blocked, Meadows said.

“We don’t have any reports of injuries and there is no one unaccounted for that we’ve been made aware of,” he noted.

— E-mail: mcbrooks@register-herald.com

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