CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Residents of the Kanawha Valley were keeping a leery eye on streams near their homes early Tuesday morning. A flood watch turned quickly into a flood warning as several small streams left their banks and started to cover roadways.
“Typical places we frequently have high water events like Kanawha Two-Mile at Eden’s Fork and places like that,” said C.W. Sigman, Kanawha County’s Deputy Emergency Services Director. “Millwood Drive and the Tyler Mountain areas, just the typical places.”
Sigman said most of the smaller streams had started to recede by mid morning, but the larger creeks were rising with the runoff. The biggest problem was the bulk of the heavy rain bands moved through during the hours before daylight.
“The time frame we had that issue it was dark,” said Sigman. “It was dark and folks can’t see the water over the road and they get into it before they realize it. Daylight hours, they’ll make a good decision and not drive through it.”
Volunteer Fire fighters had to rescue two motorists when they became stranded after driving vehicles into flooded roadways.
Home damage was limited to several basements which were inundated with water. In most cases, fire fighters responded to check out the issues, but opted to let residents wait out the water on the upper floors rather than evacuating people from their homes.
“One of the things we don’t want to do is move people out of relative safety,” Sigman said. “Even though there’s water in your basement or around your home, we have to put you in harm’s way to get you out. Sometimes it’s best to wait it out until the water goes down. There’s no need to go into any worse danger.”
The flood warning for Kanawha County was due to end at noon.