Severe Storms Strike WV

RSOE:

Heavy thundershowers swept across Southern West Virginia on Thursday, sending dozens of small streams out of their banks and across roads, isolating numerous communities and temporarily marooning students in at least three schools. The storm struck Thursday morning with a mixture of torrential rains, lightning and pea-size hail. During a briefing at the Logan County Emergency Services headquarters, Sen. Art Kirkendoll, D-Logan, told Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin that 1.7 inches of rain fell on Logan in a 75-minute period Thursday morning. Flood-prone Mud Fork, which passes through Verdunville before emptying into Holden Creek on the outskirts of Logan, suffered the heaviest damage from the storm. Mud Fork Road was blocked by high water, debris and slides throughout the day, leaving residents unable to leave, or receive outside assistance. About 45 students, along with teachers and staff, were preparing to spend the night at Verdunville Elementary School, blocked by high water, but secure on a hillside. An additional eight students were stranded at Logan Middle School, since buses were unable to take them to their homes.rnrn Students and staff were also stranded at Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College, where water from Mud Fork entered at least one building at the Logan County campus and flooded a number of cars in its parking lot. An estimated 150 to 200 homes and businesses were damaged by Thursday's flooding.

"We're in a rescue mode," Sonya Porter, deputy director of Logan County Emergency Services, told Tomblin, Adjutant General James Hoyer, and other state officials during Thursday's briefing. "We still can't get to the people along Mud Fork and some of the hollows." While no deaths or injuries were reported, Porter said two mobile homes had apparently been overturned by floodwaters near Rock House Branch of Mud Fork, and rescue crews were anxious to make sure their occupants were safe and accounted for.

Nine swift water rescue crews, including units from Kanawha and Boone counties, had begun conducting health and welfare checks on those living along Mud Fork and other hard hit areas on Thursday afternoon. Hoyer said four West Virginia Army National Guard Humvees were on the way to Logan County, and three to Lincoln County, to assist in making health and welfare checks and evacuating those in need of care.

A hoist-equipped helicopter was being sent from Parkersburg to Logan to help make emergency extractions. Runoff from hillsides flooded several streets in downtown, while water from Mud Fork and Holden Creek flooded streets in the Mount Gay-Shamrock area, and covered W.Va. 44 at several points between Mount Gay and Omar for much of the day. Emergency officials said the Man area of Logan County received relatively little damage from the storm.