Five-hundred-year flood leaves region dazed

Politicians promise funds for damages

By FRITZ MAYER

NORTHEAST, U.S. — The intense storms that spawned the historic flood of 2006 spread disaster far and wide. Two hundred thousand people were ordered evacuated from Wilkes Barre, PA, where it was feared that the levees that protect the city from the Susquehanna River might not hold against the record flooding. Officials estimate 50,000 heeded the call.

Near Sidney, NY, two truck drivers lost their lives when their rigs¾headed in opposite directions on I-88¾plunged into a 25-foot sink hole created when a culvert collapsed because of the rushing floodwaters.

Closer to home, in Livingston Manor, NY, the body of 15-year-old Jamie Bertholf was discovered Thursday afternoon buried in mud and debris. Her home, near the confluence of the Willowemac and Cattail Creek, collapsed and was partially washed away in the flooding on Wednesday.

Beyond the human toll, the flood damage will cost millions of dollars to repair. Richard Matinkovic, the emergency services coordinator of Sullivan County, said the damage estimate in the county alone was already up to $5 million by last Thursday, and could possibly go much higher.

Evacuations

There were many evacuations in the area. In Eldred, 600 children and adults from a local Jewish camp went to the Eldred High School when floodwater began inundating the camp.

Throughout the flooding, families were evacuated from dozens of communities including Tammany Flats, Honesdale, Barryville, Narrowsburg, Callicoon, Jeffersonville and Youngsville.

In Jeffersonville, the most evacuations came on Wednesday afternoon as the floodwaters were receding. Gregg Semenetz said his team went to inspect the dam on Lake Jeffersonville on Wednesday. There had been some erosion of the dam, and his team noticed some unusual ripples on the spillway.

To be on the safe side, some 200 residents of Jeffersonville were ordered evacuated. Many of them went to the Jeffersonville campus of the Sullivan West school district, but there was no water there, so most found alternate places to stay. About 30 were transferred to the Sullivan West high school at Lake Huntington.

Early on Thursday morning, a representative of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FERC) inspected the dam and declared it to be safe.

The residents went home and the Red Cross center at the high school was closed down Thursday afternoon.