a truck went into the flooding river - did the road give way? ms O tied a cable to her car, other end to her husband (some say it was an extension cord) and in he went to pull the guy out of the truck. once he had the guy, D. drove her car away pulling them from the river minutes before the flash flood of the jumped river came down and took the truck away.
during the storm we were evacuated at the fire station. nobody could get any information. that night we could get home to our house, after the rain let up and the flood stopped rising. still no way to get information. but then we started getting calls from friends (we have an old wired phone we hooked up) who were telling us what they saw on TV - where the storm was and what we could expect during the night. we had calls from california, south carolina, ohio, and even ethiopia!
that night i looked down from the upstairs window into the wind tossed black-black electricityless night and saw for the first and probably last time in my life foxfire softly glowing on a rotten log below!
early in the morning after, mr A arrives at the village mom & pop store with a check for $1000 and the instruction that anyone needing food should be given it free. food was free all day to all comers anyway.
partly because the store had no generator to keep the freezers going. lots and lots of food was sent up to the volunteer fire dept, as was all the food from the school (it was to have been the first day of school) and a big cookout blowout town wide dinner was held at the fire dept for anyone who could get there.
later the store located a generator to use, but food remained free to all for the rest of the day. the streets were full of people all day, exchanging information and help, and the volunteer firemen were everywhere pumping out cellars and giving out whatever supplies they could. by the next day the national guard had arrived with bottled water, MRE meals, cleaning supplies and more. mr X who has his own helicopter went back and forth overhead taking arial photos for whatever use may come in the future.
early the morning after, old mr O started calling the government to get permission to volunteer to work on the flooding. after many hours he got the OK and took his Great Big Yellow Machine to the flood where he spent all afternoon and half the night clearing under the bridge, digging the riverbed back to where it belonged, and when he was done the river was back in it's bed, altho of course everything it carried off, including the road, was still gone. i think he had the time of his life!
as the assessment and pumping continued all day, the street was like a party - no traffic could go, but everyone was out walking and talking. two of the firemen were catching 3 and 4 inch trout from sinkholes with their bare hands, and taking them back to the river.
.
No comments:
Post a Comment