At least 23 people have died in the state of West Virginia from sweeping floods caused by incessant rains and overflowing creeks and rivers, according to the State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management on Friday.
Hundreds of homes were destroyed or badly damaged, as trees were uprooted from their roots and power lines fell. Many residents were stranded at their homes or locations, awaiting rescue.
"I'm afraid that will go higher; some of the hardest-hit areas are areas that we can't get into," Kent Carper, the president of the Kanawha County Commission, told the New York Times. "How many homes have been destroyed, nobody knows. We have not even started the property assessment."
People were rescued from cars, upper floors of their houses, and from tops of trees.
"My wife was out there four and a half hours hanging in a tree with a house burning right beside her, flood waters running all around her," Ronnie Scott, a resident of White Sulphur Springs, told Associated Press. The house caught fire, but his wife Belinda who was alone in the house at the time, managed to escape through a vent in attic. However, she sustained burns on 67 percent of her body.
Governor Earl Ray Tomblin declared emergency for 44 counties in the state, and authorized deployment of about 500 National Guard members to assist in relief and rescue operations.
The guardsmen helped local rescue crews with swift water searches and extraction of stranded people. Federal Emergency Management Agency and military helicopters helped in the rescue works.
Greenbrier River at Hilldale was flowing 13 feet above flood level, Elk River at Queen Shoals had crested 17 feet above flood stage, and many other rivers including Meadow River at Hines was also flooded 7 feet above danger.
A trailer house was caught on camera in White Sulphur Springs that was ripped apart from its moorings, and caught fire as it was carried along by the gushing flood water.
Many other houses were completely destroyed from their foundations and caught fire.
Some parts of Greenbrier County received about 10 inches of rain, which scientists say is a very rare occurrence.
"The amount of rain that recently fell on parts of West Virginia and southern Virginia exceeded a once-in-a-century event for the specific area and resulted in catastrophic flooding in some communities," said AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alex Sosnowski.
As many as 500 people were stuck in a mall in Elkview which houses several stores and restaurants, when a bridge connecting the mall to the main road collapsed in the raging waters. Many people had to spend the night in the plaza or in their cars. Governor Tomblin ordered to make temporary arrangement for rescue workers to reach the mall.
Pinch Volunteer Fire Department rescued some of the stranded people through another way over the hillside. Many others chose to wait for a new gravel road which is being built to cover the gap.
Over 60 more roads were washed out by the floods in the state.
"This was so violent," said Wayne Pennington, the fire chief in Lewisburg, Greenbrier County. "It removed structures. It swept cars away. It destroyed trees, guard rails. It churned up the earth. It exposed water lines and broke them. It was just mass destruction on a scale I've never seen."
