West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Telling West Virginia's Story
Last year, we spoke with Keith Thompson and his mother Gerda right after the flood. Keith’s dad Edward passed away from complications of hypothermia after being in floodwaters for several hours. Inside Appalachia host Jessica Lilly went back to Rainelle to see how things have changed since the flood. She found that for Keith, the flood was just the beginning of his heartaches in the past year.
This video is part of a 30 minute TV special, “Inside Appalachia: A Year of Recovery.”
The National Weather Service forecasts heavy rain across West Virginia starting late Thursday and continuing into early Saturday from Tropical Storm Cindy until another front pushes through Friday night into Saturday.
Meteorologists say the combination of systems could produce flooding during the day and night Friday.
They say stronger thunderstorms Friday afternoon and evening also could bring damaging wind gusts.
The Kanawha County Commission says emergency officials are monitoring the forecast for rain showers expected late Thursday night in the greater Charleston area with heavy rain at times continuing into Friday and Saturday morning.
The storm comes on the anniversary of last year’s torrential rains and flooding and killed 23 people in West Virginia.
Inside Appalachia co-producer and host Jessica Lilly sat down with Major General James A. Hoyer of the WV National Guard to discuss the year of recovery that West Virginia faced since the flooding of June 2016. Parts of this interview are included in a special TV show, “Inside Appalachia: A Year of Recovery.” You can watch the show Tuesday night at 6:30 p.m. on WVPB or listen on radio.
In June 2016, floodwaters ravaged parts of West Virginia. Forty-four of the state’s 55 counties were in a state of emergency and 12 counties were declared federal disaster areas. Water carved a path of destruction unseen in generations – earning the title of the 1,000 Year Flood. Twenty-three deaths were attributed to the flood.
Watch the full interview here:
At the height of this disaster, FEMA received about 9,000 applications for assistance. In this interview, Major General James A. Hoyer says W.Va. is doing “pretty good” in the recovery process.
"We are in one lap of a very long race and we’ve got a long way to go… We owe it to the people who lost their lives and the people who were impacted by this to do it right and to do it effectively and to do it in a way that we are a better state and we are better communities than before the flood happened," Major General Hoyer said.
While there are several counties mostly back to normal, Hoyer says there are some areas that still have a long way to go. Areas that still have the most work left to do include parts of Nicholas, Kanawha, Greenbrier, and Clay Counties.
Benefits of the Flood
The West Virginia National Guard has been overseeing the FEMA demolition project. Hoyer says in connection with some state funding, the FEMA demolition project has provided the resources to take care of existing issues with abandoned buildings.
FEMA Demolition Project By Numbers
Readying for the Next Disaster
Major General Hoyer told Jessica Lilly that several guards people were impacted by the flood. This created a unique challenge because they often wouldn’t take the time to off to work on their own needs.
Since the flood, the West Virginia National Guard has updated a few strategies in disaster relief.
Friday June 23rd marks the one year anniversary of the 1,000 year floods, which left 23 dead in West Virginia and thousands of homes and businesses destroyed. West Virginia Public Broadcasting is spending the next few days hearing from some of the people who were affected by the flood, and hearing how residents are rebuilding their communities.
In a quiet neighborhood in Rainelle, John Wyatt just completed renovations on his one story home. Volunteer workers with the faith-based Appalachian Service Project spent the past year helping put up drywall, cleaning out the mud, putting on a new porch, and making the house livable again.
But he still can’t shake the memories of that tragic night, when he joined the rescue operations, paddling a rescue boat, and saving people who were trapped in the flood waters.
“As time goes on, we’re struggling to get through the after effects of what went on during the flood, when you guys filmed me after the flood, and you were filming me then, and I was talking about how I could hear those cries of the people in the dark.”
15 people died in Greenbrier County during the flood. Many of them were Wyatt’s friends and neighbors in Rainelle.
A video of this story will be featured in a new 30 minute Inside Appalachia TV episode about the 1000 year flood in West Virginia. Watch it June 20th at 6:30 on West Virginia Public Broadcasting.
“And for weeks and weeks you know, that was something I’d wake in the middle of the night and I would think about that.”
Wyatt was one of those who escaped the flood with his life but lost all his possessions, including his musical instruments and years of recorded oral histories with his family and friends.
"It's a little frightening to look at our town. I know where each person lived, so many of them, and those houses are gone now."- John Wyatt
This past year, he’s been so busy working on his home, and volunteering to help other people, he hasn’t had a lot of energy to do the things he used to do, like play music, or sit on his back porch and relax over a cup of coffee.
Wyatt isn’t the only one who’s trying to get back to normal. More than one hundred and twenty homeowners in Rainelle have applied to FEMA for help demolishing their damaged homes. That’s a huge loss for a community with just under 1,500 people.
Wyatt drives through town, pointing out the homes that were lost. “It’s a little frightening to look at our town. I know where each person lived, so many of them, and those houses are gone now,” said Wyatt. “I’m the only house left in this entire block. And all the other homes, seven or eight of them are gone.”
Across town from John Wyatt, Sharon G Martin has just moved into a small, one-bedroom apartment. She lost her home in the flood, and she’s been living with family for the past year.
Dave Lumsden, chairman of the Greater Greenbrier Longterm recovery Committee, delivered a new donated mattress and a box spring to her new apartment.
The Greater Greenbrier Longterm Recovery Committee is a local organization that helps coordinate resources to help flood victims, like Martin.
Her face is worn with worry from the past year, but her bright green eyes are shining as she realizes she won’t have to sleep on the floor tonight. “I’ve always been a positive thinker. So I always have faith and hope for the best. And things are falling in place. I’m happy. It’s better now, and it’s getting better,” Martin said, looking over her new furniture that charity groups had donated.
Martin has been waiting to get an apartment for the past 10 months while she stayed with her daughter.
Others had to leave Rainelle, or West Virginia, to try to settle someplace new.
John Wyatt said he’s watched some of his close friends move away.
“I pastor a small church outside of Rainelle, and we’re down to just bare minimum. We were a small church before the flood, but we’re a really small church now since the flood. Because we’ve had people that moved away.”
Rainelle was struggling economically before the flood. With the decline in the timber industry, many jobs here have disappeared over the past fifty years.
But, Wyatt said, there’s a positive change in the air too, something he hasn’t seen in decades. “I do see something happening that wasn’t happening before the flood. I see people working together, and I see the community coming together.”
Thousands of volunteers have poured into Rainelle this past year, most of them from out of state.
“Not only did they come in and hang sheet rock and paint houses and do all the work that they’ve done, but they brought hope to people again,” said Wyatt.
Rebuilding this town will take years. Wyatt said he’s looking forward to volunteering again next year with the Appalachian Service Project, as they continue to help people who lost their homes in the flood.
On Friday, October 28, 2016, just a little more than four months after June’s historic flooding, 83-year-old Gerda Thompson passed away. Thompson lost her husband Edward during the 2016 flood that ravaged West Virginia in June. In July, she was featured in an Inside Appalachia TV special called West Virginia’s 1,000 Year Flood.
On Saturday, October 29th, her son Keith Thompson posted the news of her death on Facebook:
“The nightmare that started for my mother in the flood in Rainelle which started on June 23rd is over. Gerda Thompson passed peacefully last night at 9:12 p.m. at Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown. Last Saturday my mother had a stroke from which she never recovered. Dad and Mom are once again together. May they enjoy eternity as much together as they did here on earth.”
Gerda Thompson’s home was damaged due to the June floods. Throughout the summer, volunteers worked to restore her house. Thompson moved back into her home in Rainelle about a month before her death.
In this special television broadcast of Inside Appalachia with host Jessica Lilly, WVPB brings you the stories of heroism and survival in towns like Richwood, Rainelle, and Clendenin. Residents and community leaders share their stories of loss and resilience.
The National Weather Service called the June 2016 flooding in southern West Virginia an exceptional meteorological event, a vicious line-up of storms that came in simultaneously from multiple directions.
Almost 8 inches of rain fell in some spots in just 12 to 18 hours. That amount of rain in such a short time period is something expected once in 1,000 years, according to the NWS.
The area damaged in southern West Virginia is unprecedented.
West Virginia Public Broadcasting reporters fan out throughout southern West Virginia, assessing the damage, following recovery efforts, and documenting the monumental task of cleaning-up.
http://video.wvpublic.org/video/2365823462
Listen to interviews of volunteers who felt compelled to gather needed supplies, and come help.
The program features behavioral health specialists discussing help available for dealing with trauma from natural disasters. The broadcast also examines the state’s plan forward to rebuild these devastated communities with a conversation with Adjunct General, Major General James Hoyer of the WV National Guard, now Chief Recovery Coordinator, appointed by Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin.
We would like to thank and acknowledge the underwriters of Inside Appalachia – West Virginia’s 1000 Year Flood: Catholic Charities West Virginia, West Virginia University, and Concord University.
