The force of nature

History of floods leaves officials planning for the next "big one"

By Jacob Geiger

The next time floodwaters rise in Rockbridge County or Buena Vista, Jim Smith will be the one piloting a boat up the river to rescue you.

For the past five years, Smith and other volunteers from the Buena Vista Fire Department have pulled people from floodwaters, helped boaters who ran into trouble on the Maury River and retrieved the bodies of drowning victims.

"Hurricane Isabel came two weeks after our training ended, and on our first call we were all out on the boat in the middle of the night, scared to death," Smith said. Team members spent their first night on the job rescuing people endangered by flooding on the South River.  The team has since grown from six founding members to almost 20, and now volunteers from the Kerr's Creek Fire Department are also taking swift-water training.

Avoiding a repeat of past disasters

Rockbridge County has had 13 federally declared disasters since 1969, a number that ties it with Bedford and Botetourt Counties for the most in Virginia during the last 40 years.

As the name suggests, 100-year storms should happen once each century.  But Rockbridge County has seen four of those storms, and the flooding that results from them, in the last seven decades.

Even some areas that are considered practically flood-proof -- like hilly Lexington -- can be paralyzed by the kind of snow and ice storms that hit the area in 1994 and 1996, when up to three feet of snow shut down power and rendered even snow-removal equipment useless.

When disasters strike, the area's autonomous volunteer fire and rescue squads and their tradition of piecemeal emergency planning mean there probably won't be one coordinated response.  If all three localities are affected by one event, then each may have to go it alone.

Glasgow and Buena Vista have a long history of devastating floods.  In 1969, Hurricane Camille left both cities under water and severe flash flooding soaked the area again in 1985 and 1995.

In 1969, Hurricane Camille left Glasgow under 14 feet of water.

After the last flood, Buena Vista got federal and state money to build a $42 million floodwall that protects the city from the Maury River and several feeder creeks.  So far the wall, an earthen berm reinforced with boulders that was completed in 1997, has done its job.

Buena Vista Police Chief A.J. Panebianco is the city's emergency management coordinator.  He says the city has flood evacuation plans in case the Maury ever manages to flood over the wall.

"We have evacuation plans for the whole city, but we know some areas probably won't flood," Panebianco said.

According to Panebianco and the city's flood maps, everything south of 20th Street and between the Maury River and Walnut Street, an area that includes the downtown business district and at least 100 homes, would probably flood if the water went over the flood wall.

During a severe flood, Panebianco said, the city would open a shelter at Parry McCluer Middle School, at the corner of 23rd and Chestnut Streets in Buena Vista.  The school is west of Walnut, but Panebianco said it is far enough north to be out of the flood plain.

"It's never flooded as far as I know," Panebianco said.  "In the event that it did flood our alternate shelters are Southern Virginia University and the high school."

Despite this designation in the city's emergency plan, few residents of Buena Vista may actually know where to go in case of a flood. Only one of six people interviewed for this story knew to go to the school. Brenda Floyd, a hairstylist at the Glamour Hut in Buena Vista, lost everything in the 1985 flood, but knows where to go next time it happens.

State Farm agent Amy Hostetter wasn't so sure. After thinking for a moment, she said, "No, I guess I don't know that question." Her co-worker, Amanda Hood, said she wasn't too concerned about not knowing. She said she would just listen to the radio for information about where to go.

The new Parry McCluer High School -- located on a high hill in the southeast part of town -- cannot be used as a primary shelter because the access road might wash out during heavy rain and leave people trapped at the high school. 

"The high school's great, but we just aren't sure about the road," Panebianco said.

Though Glasgow, located at the confluence of the James and Maury Rivers, has also avoided severe flooding over the last 13 years, the town has no similar protection.  The Glasgow Rescue Squad has a Zodiac inflatable boat and a jet ski for use during floods or to assist boaters on the James and Maury.

Capt. Robert Hickman said his squad has several people who are trained in swift-water rescue and could use the boat and jet ski during a flood.  The Buena Vista squad could be called to assist with evacuations in Glasgow during a flood, he said.

During a flood, Hickman said, the rescue squad works with the fire department to assist with evacuations.
The goal is to evacuate residents before the waters surround homes.  If the residents become trapped, the rescue squad would use its boats and call on the Buena Vista swift water team for assistance.
 
"The town ... over the last few years has taken a lot of steps to keep some of the side tributaries or mountain stream channels ... clear of debris that would back water up and cause interior flooding," Hickman said.  "As far as preparing for the river flooding, other than knowing what areas to monitor ... I think they've pretty much done all they can do."
 
According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, more than half of Glasgow's homes lie in the flood plains of the James and Maury Rivers.  The town is in the process of purchasing more than 55 houses that will either be put on stilts on their present sites or relocated to avoid the floodwaters. 

City on a hill

Unlike other parts of the county, Lexington is largely protected from flooding.  Police Chief Steve Crowder, the city's emergency coordinator, and Director of Public Works David Woody said the only area likely to flood is Jordan's Point, which the city bought several years ago and turned into a park.

"We've pretty much eliminated our problems with flooding in the city boundaries," Crowder said.

But Woody said that heavy rains can make it difficult for the city to get clean water out of the Maury River.
 
"During the election day flood of 1985 --- they lost power down at the [water treatment] plant and the pumps were under water," Woody said.  "As Virginia Power was restoring power we took an old fire truck that had pumping capability and used it to pump water to the water plant so it could be treated once the power came back on.  That was a 100-year storm in 1985, and we were able to continue to produce water."

Crowder and Woody said that the natural disaster most likely to cause problems for the city is a severe snow- or ice storm that knocks out power lines and makes it difficult for food to reach Lexington.

"What started all this hoopla about emergency management ... was the change of the millennium in 2000," Crowder said.  "People were scared to death on December 31st, 1999.  That started us being prepared." 
 
There was fear across the world that as the dates on computers rolled over from '99 to '00 the computers would think it was 1900 instead of 2000.
 
Governments and companies worked to back up computer systems on crucial systems at power plants, hospitals and water treatment plants. The fears turned out to be unfounded, and the New Year arrived without any major problems.

During an emergency, Woody says, the public works department gets directions from the police department. He said the first priority is making sure trees or downed power lines aren't blocking any roads. 

Woody says that when severe storms are on the way the department tries to put its equipment and crews on alert in the hours before a storm.  The city has six snowplows that can be used to clear roads.  During longer storms, crews work in 12-hour shifts.
 
"If we're notified by the police department that a severe storm is going to hit at approximately 2 a.m., what we'll do is send the night crew home late in the day so they can get some rest and then we'll bring them back in at midnight ... so they can already be here when the snow hits," Woody said.  "We want them here before the storm starts so the equipment's running, its checked out and ready to go."

Woody says snowplows have sometimes led fire trucks to fires, clearing the roads in front of the truck. During one storm, he said, a snowplow was even used to pick up a doctor from home and take him into Carilion Stonewall Jackson Hospital to treat a patient.

Ready and waiting

Smith says the Buena Vista swift-water team has come a long way since that first night on the South River.
The team has even started responding to calls in Bath County and other areas. In the meantime, Buena Vista and Glasgow residents hope the Maury and James Rivers stay in their banks and the swift-water squad stays at the fire station.

"It's often a sad situation when we have to go out on a call, but the more calls we go on the more comfortable we get with the job," Smith said.