Residents think about what was left behind after evacuation

The chilly late afternoon wind blowing across thousands of flooded acres Thursday didn't keep Dan Campbell and Shannon Ritter from spending some time in a pickup truck on Cape Girardeau County County Road 233 looking at the home they rented in November.

They were chatting with Wayne and Rodney Blumenberg, brothers who have lived their entire lives on the farmland north of Allenville, and talking about what they left behind in a hurried evacuation Wednesday and how they discovered that it was time to abandon their houses.

"I woke at 6 when the alarm went off and went to throw Pete outside and about launched him into the water," Ritter said. Pete is her beagle.

There was no water around the house when she and Campbell returned home late Tuesday, watched the TV news as rain continued to fall and went to their rest confident that they were safe.

The trip back Thursday afternoon -- Ritter and Campbell are staying with her father -- was "just to see it hadn't got in the living room," she said.

And while it appeared from a distance of about a half-mile that the home's interior was still dry, Ritter ticked off a list of property that is lost -- a Dodge 1500 Ram pickup, a Ford Ranger purchased Friday, a lawnmower purchased Saturday and a four-wheel all-terrain vehicle.

Ritter and Campbell were removed from their home by the Coast Guard in a small boat.

While Ritter and Campbell recently moved into their home, the Blumenberg brothers can trace 130 years of their family's roots in southwest Cape Girardeau County. The flood, Wayne Blumenberg said, is the worst he has seen, and the water rose faster than he has ever experienced. "Normally we have enough time to see it coming," he said. At 1:30 a.m. Wednesday, "it was nothing. At 4:30 a.m., I heard banging in the basement -- the freezer was floating around and hitting the walls."

Wayne Blumenberg said he and his brother were lifted out by helicopter about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Allenville, a village of 100, is deserted, surrounded by water. Anyone trying to drive there must get past Cape Girardeau County deputies stationed at roadblocks on every paved road.

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126