THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, January 21, 1996 TAG: 9601210094
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: STAFF & WIRE REPORTS
LENGTH: Long : 121 lines
More than 100,000 people were ordered to move to high ground Saturday at Wilkes-Barre, Pa., and hundreds more were urged to get out of communities on the Delaware and Ohio rivers to escape devastating flooding.
``We are bracing for a very dangerous weekend,'' said John Comey, spokesman for the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency.
At least 30 deaths since midweek were blamed on the combination of cold, blizzard conditions and flooding from the Plains to the East Coast. Four people were missing.
Hundreds of roads and bridges were closed by high water, along with some water and sewage plants. Barges and pleasure boats broke from their moorings and drifted on the Ohio River and its upper tributaries.
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge's family fled the Governor's Mansion in Harrisburg when water surrounded the home. Other evacuations were under way in the city Saturday evening.
Wilkes-Barre residents, meanwhile, were given the all-clear to return home about 10 hours after their mandatory evacuation.
In Trenton, N.J., the recently renovated Statehouse annex and its parking garage were flooded by waters overflowing from the Delaware River. The annex houses the Statehouse bill room and the Office of Legislative Services Library. It was not immediately known if any documents were damaged.
In Virginia, flood watches and warnings remained in effect Saturday in the west, although no serious flooding had been reported since Friday, when the quick return to cold weather halted the snow melt.
An estimated 400 secondary roads in the state remained closed Saturday, said Larry Dodd, a spokesman for the Virginia Department of Transportation. But, he said, the number and locations were constantly changing as water continued flowing toward rivers and streams from higher elevations.
In Page County, where the Skyline Lakes Dam was overflowing and residents were bracing for it to give way, the earthen dam held, said Janet Clements of the Department of Emergency Services.
In Shenandoah County, a state police helicopter brought cellular telephones to two mountain neighborhoods cut off by the Shenandoah River.
And in Great Falls in Northern Virginia, U.S. Park Police had to rescue four people stranded on rocks in the Potomac River. Three women and a man became stranded after walking onto the rocks when the river rose and they couldn't get back to shore.
They were airlifted out by a park service helicopter.
Among the areas under continued flood warnings were the Rapidan River near Culpeper, the Shenandoah near Strasburg, Lynnwood and Front Royal, and Goose Creek near Leesburg.
A burst of record warmth that contributed to the rapid snow melt and flooding in the East was squeezed off the continent by arctic temperatures.
Fearful of a repeat of deadly 1972 floods, officials in Pennsylvania ordered the relocation of more than 100,000 people from flood-plain areas of Wilkes-Barre and surrounding communities.
Buses, ambulances, trucks and vans were used to carry residents to Red Cross shelters in schools and town halls, Luzerne County emergency official Al Bardar said.
Residents were given the all-clear to return home about 10 hours later, after the Susquehanna River crested about 1 1/2 feet below flood stage.
Pennsylvania State Police and the National Guard were still operating under an emergency declaration issued Jan. 7, when a blizzard stopped the region in its tracks and piled up much of the snow that melted into this weekend's floods. Roughly 1,000 Guard soldiers were on flood duty.
In south-central Pennsylvania, operating power at the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station was reduced in case a quick shutdown becomes necessary, a spokesman said.
About 400 families were evacuated overnight from Port Jervis, N.Y., as the Delaware and Neversink rivers rose out of their banks near the point where New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania meet, 60 miles north-northwest of New York City.
About 1,500 were evacuated elsewhere in upstate New York along the Conhocton and Canisteo rivers.
And downstream on the Delaware along the New Jersey shore, hundreds of people were evacuated in Warren County after an ice dam broke and released an 8-foot surge of water, authorities said.
``On the road along the river, cars are under water,'' said Bob DeGraff, Warren County emergency management coordinator.
Elsewhere across Pennsylvania, water closed major roads in Harrisburg and submerged Pittsburgh's Point State Park, the downtown site where the Monongahela and Allegheny rivers join to form the Ohio.
Pittsburgh police knocked on doors of the Three Rivers Plaza senior citizen apartment building early Saturday, rushing residents to pack and get out.
``Oh my heavens, I didn't have time to think about what was happening,'' said 85-year-old Edyth Murovich.
Downstream from Pittsburgh, the Ohio also was flooding along West Virginia's Northern Panhandle, and authorities urged 7,500 people to get off Wheeling Island, a low-lying urban enclave connected by bridge to Wheeling, W.Va. The river was expected to crest 12 feet above flood stage there today.
``This morning police come with bullhorns, flashing lights, saying, `It's going to 51 feet, it's time to leave,' '' said Plennie Clutter, a longtime resident who opted to stay even though his basement was flooded.
In nearby Wellsburg, Mayor Ernie Jack and several city employees have been trapped since Friday in the water treatment plant.
``We've been reading the gauges every half hour and calling the results to the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh so that they can monitor the situation,'' Jack said.
West Virginia Gov. Gaston Caperton declared a state of emergency in 29 counties and sent National Guardsmen to help evacuate residents in several areas.
More than 1,000 were forced to evacuate communities on the Ohio side of the river. ILLUSTRATION: ASSOCIATED PRESS COLOR PHOTO
At right, Main Street in Plymouth, Pa., on Saturday.
Map
KEN WRIGHT/The Virginian-Pilot
Photo
Scott Brimmer, a firefighter in Ashland, N.Y., is towed to safety
Friday. While rescuing a woman from her home, the firefighters' boat
was swept away, stranding Brimmer.
KEYWORDS: FLOODING by CNB