[N&W] Report on Flooding in Mullens WV

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

[Marty Swartz writes:]

Many of you have doubtless heard of the severe flooding that occurred in 
southern West Virginia on Sunday July 8th.  (See 
http://www.cnn.com/2001/WEATHER/07/10/westvirginia.flooding.ap/index.html 
for one report.) The Guyandotte River, noted as one of the most heavily 
affected, runs right through Mullens WV. Efforts of Jack Feller, many 
retired VGN employees, and others have put together a fine VGN museum in a 
C-10 caboose located right on the riverbank. Jack is an active local 
historian, with four books in the "Memories and Photos of Mullens" 
appearing under his name. Folks who have met Jack know that he is retired, 
and does most of his historical research at the offices of the family 
insurance agency, now run by his son.  Here is the word on local 
conditions, as passed along by Robert Lee Moore, a N&WHS member living in 
Charleston.

[Bob said:]
"It was bad. Six feet deep in Jack Feller's office where he kept a lot 
historical  records. Only Six to eight inches in the caboose, about "1 - 2" 
of mud. Cleared much of debris from  the upstream end of caboose, hosed out 
inside floor. It needs to be cleaned out thoroughly & a good swabbing 
inside. Much of the artifacts in the caboose are safe: some books on the 
bottom shelf of the display case got wet & muddy, but  they are drying out. 
Lots of mud underneath cab & track scooter. New Historical sign knocked 
down as was rail cross-buck.  Looks pretty good for the shape it's in."

"The area is still a disaster zone. No one is allowed in unless you are 
there to work, and help  is still needed. Been there the past two days. 
More later."

-Bob Moore
___________________________________________________________________________
[Tom Salmon wrote in:]
All

Arrived Mullins 9 AM Thursday and helped Jack clean his office. Basically 
salvaged his photo albums and junked the rest. 6 and 1/2 feet of water in 
his office. 6 inches in the Caboose museum. Bob Moore went to Mullins Sat. 
to work on Caboose museum.

NS (ex-VGN line) broken in a couple of places near Mullins and also between 
Page and Robson in the Loup Creek valley. Should be back up and open by 
Sunday. WV Route 10 at Bud was completely undercut and was not in service 
as of Saturday.

Destruction was extensive from Maben down to Mullins. All of downtown 
Mullins was under 6 ft of water. On Thursday the mud had shrunk to only 
1-1/2 inches, but as it dried the DUST was beginning to become intolerable. 
Reports from Pineville and along the old N&W line at Kimball and Welch 
indicate equal disaster. State, federal and private organizations organized 
and active in Mullins, though some isolated folks weren't "rescued" until 
48 hours had passed. Looters were active Sunday night, especially seeking 
the "hillbilly heroin" in the drugstores. Others, who were not directly 
affected by the waters, were seen in the free food lines. (Mullins did have 
power on Thursday - even in downtown)

The National Guard was providing free trash removal. In front of every 
house was piles of furniture and other assorted soaked trash. I have been 
through the Agnes floods of 1972 in Elmira/Corning and I hated to tell 
folks that that was only the beginning. Folks will try to salvage 
everything but the next stuff to come out to the curb will be the water 
heaters and refrigerators and other stuff will both insulation and 
electronics. More furniture and rugs will follow. Then comes the 
"no-longer" dry wall and then the wall insulation and probably the wiring. 
Tile floors need to come up in order to dry the sub floor and insure that 
all the germs are cleaned and killed. (I will paraphrase your mother: Do 
you know where your river has been.)

A flood is a truly dirty, nasty, disgusting event.

Tom Salmon

[Tom forwarded an earlier e-mail from Aubrey Wiley:]

Betty and I have just walked in the door! We were there at 10:00 and did far
more than I thought we could do! The entire area is unbelievable! We were
came in from Beckley, the ONLY way in, we saw a nice lawn with a tent. Then
we saw an area where a house used to be! Remember last night I said that
Mrs. Feller had said she had recognized parts of friends and neighbor's homes
as they floated by? Well, today I saw where she saw them go by, over the
highway! Yes, the highway became the river at some time! We retrieved many
of Jack's belongings and our hearts broke for him! The poor man is in a daze
because his entire life's collection may be lost! We did persuade him to
keep his W.W.II uniforms and a 48 star flag we found! After 6 hours work,
Betty, myself, Jack, his two sons and "Sarge," we finally got to where Jack
could look into his office! And this was their third day of working there!
We retrieved some of his photo albums and brought them home to try to soak in
a special solution to save them. In my previous life as photojournalist I
had to do this sometimes. At jack's home he has electricity and gas as of
sundown. Still no hope of water though. Salvation Army is there and turning
out meals by the hundreds. believe me, this Christmas I'll be nicer to the
bell ringers!

Cheers!
Aubrey
_____________________________________________________________
[Bob Moore writes in again:]

"Welcome to Mullens - Grab A Shovel" - large sign in yard at 1707 Moran
Avenue, Mullens, WV.

Arrived Saturday about 10:30am Councilman Ken McBride told me of four foot
waves rolling down the main street in front of City Hall last Sunday. The
paper & the radio station were flooded out big time. The station was back on
the air, but don't know about The Mullens Advocate. Went to work on caboose.
Since water was available (for washing, not drinking or bathing), hosed out
most of the mud except for that under the sink & in a couple of the lockers
on the city hall side. Found the city flag & raised it on the flagpole.

Directed the big Massie Reclamation water truck to turn its high pressure
hose on the underside, but noticing a lot of ballast flying out, asked them
to stop for fear the cab would be washed into the creek! Apparently, the
track is ballasted but not sure it the whole shootin' match is resting on
asphalt, or what. They did break loose a lot of the mud from the debris on
the upstream end, making it easier to remove. Kurt Reisweber stopped by
briefly & assisted in removing a couple of the big tree trunks & offered to
return Sunday. Truck also cleared the mud from around the bell off "Old
#211".

As I went to offer Jack a hand, two endloader/backhoes were side-by-side
coming up Howard Street scooping debris into their buckets & filling
dumptrucks. The dust was choking.

Jack found some more cherished pictures & put them in a box. When I called
archives, Ron Davis was still there & offered to meet me that evening in
Roanoke & hand them off to Aubrey. By the time I got to Princeton
(about 7 pm), I'd made up my mind to go back to Mullens the next day,
so checked into a motel & arranged to meet Ron at Christiansburg where I
handed off the pics & Skip's 5 gallon Jerry cans he'd loaned me to get water.

Got back to Mullens via WV 10, where they were replacing a 300' road washout,
about 8:30 this morning. South Mullens (between downtown & Elmore) was
especially hard hit. A 12' high fence was coated all the way to the top with
debris & a portion had buckled. Spent most of the day shoveling, spraying, &
squeeging water out of Jack's building. About 1PM, Jack said, "It was right
about this time last week....."

They were talking about saving the paneling, but it's no use, some of the
veneer was already showing water blisters. It'll have to be replaced. He took
me to get a tetanus shot & show me around town. At the Butch Goode Bridge (WV
16), looked down in the creek bed 20' below us & saw the Mullens Senior
Citizen Van parked next in the creek. It was in parking lot near the Fire
Station until about 1pm last Sunday. Before I left Jack found another water
logged photo of Mullens taken from atop the water tower at the Electric Shop.
It's pretty bad but I couldn't bring myself to make yet another Virginia
trip, so it's in the car. I'll call Pat Dodd, (local photo restoration
expert) tomorrow & beg a favor from him.

Drove back via WV 54; WV 307 to Surveyor; WV 3 to Eccles & Sweeneyburg Road
to Pax (also hard hit). Got in about 8pm. Would've stayed longer, but ran out
of clean clothes. Might go back, though.

There's still much to do, but it has little or nothing to do with trains.
Bring square point shovels, floor squeegies, maybe a couple of those heavy
metal garden rakes (for pulling debris out).

Bob