ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, September 7, 1996 TAG: 9609090084
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: ELKTON
SOURCE: Associated Press
Hurricane Fran forced Virdus Dean to do what for 50 years had been unthinkable - abandon her farmhouse and leave her son behind in a barn as swirling floodwater rose around it.
Dean and most of her family fled across a soggy field Friday to escape flash flooding that forced police and rescuers to evacuate hundreds of houses. Many more were stranded in remote reaches of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
``We just don't know what we'll find when we get back there. Water has never come in our house in 50 years. But as fast as it's arising, there's no telling,'' said Dean, 72.
Her 45-year-old son, Robert Dean, and his wife, Beverly, went into the barn to tend to three cows and other animals and were trapped there by rapidly rising water. They took shelter in the hayloft, Dean said.
Fran's remnants dumped more than 6 inches of rain on the mountains and sent walls of water crashing down narrow hollows already sodden from storms Tuesday and Wednesday.
Officials waited for skies to clear to dispatch helicopters in areas cut off from the rest of the world by churning, muddy water.
Firefighters using pumper trucks and pickups snatched about two dozen people from the hollows and ridges around the South Fork of the Shenandoah River and neighboring Naked Creek.
``We got people hanging in trees in Naked Creek, but we can't get to them,'' said Elwood Shifflett, who ferried other rescued families to Elkton Middle School in a school bus.
Dean, her 78-year-old husband, her two granddaughters and an 18-month-old great-granddaughter left the house after a bridge to their property washed out and water began closing in. They slogged across a field, and volunteer firefighters in four-wheel-drive vehicles picked them up.
The Deans planned to sleep on cots in a middle school gymnasium and eat cheeseburgers, pizza and french fries in the school cafeteria with about nine other people. More people had sought refuge there during the day, but most left to go home with friends.
Firefighters tried several times to rescue two people who fled their car after trying to drive through a flooded portion of Naked Creek. At one point, a Navy helicopter was on its way to help, but it turned back because of poor weather. A Coast Guard helicopter rescued them at about 7 p.m.
Sam Reeves and Mike Hudeo had been stuck in a tree since 10 a.m. Two other people who tried to rescue them by boat were stranded in a nearby tree. All four were pulled to safety by the helicopter.
LENGTH: Medium: 53 linesby CNB