Southeast Missouri floods claim one life

Flash floods killed a Jackson man in Marble Hill, Mo., Tuesday and kept rescue crews throughout the region scrambling as record-shattering rain fell across the region.

The scenes were reminiscent of those from the big ice storm five weeks ago as emergency shelters opened and people were rescued from stranded cars and homes.

But this water was not frozen, and the danger wasn't from freezing for lack of power but from streams that swept cars off roads and rising water that forced officials to recommend the evacuation of towns and neighborhoods.

Thurman Shelton, 69, of Jackson was swept with his pickup truck into Crooked Creek in Marble Hill Tuesday morning, said Leo McElrath, chief deputy of the Bollinger County Sheriff's Department.

By 11 p.m., 10.77 inches of rain had fallen at Cape Girardeau Regional Airport since the rain began between 1 and 2 a.m., beating by more than 4 inches the previous record in books going back to 1960. Additional rain, heavy at times, was expected throughout the night and into today.

The rain overwhelmed the La Salle storm-water basin in Cape Girardeau and closed numerous streets throughout the city. In Jackson, officials by nightfall had stopped counting which streets were closed.

Public works crews were rushing to barricade flooded streets, but that didn't stop some motorists from ignoring the roadblocks and finding themselves stranded.

"There is not much we can do about it," assistant public works director Steve Cook said. "It needs to stop."

Gov. Matt Blunt activated the State Emergency Management Agency and the Missouri National Guard as the rain closed dozens of roads from Interstate 70 to the Arkansas border, and the Missouri State Water Patrol and the Missouri Department of Conservation added boats to the rescue efforts. Two other deaths were reported in storm-related incidents, including a Missouri Department of Transportation worker killed as he set up a barricade.

The details from Southeast Missouri:

• Cape Girardeau County. The town of Delta was severely flooded in parts, a shelter was opened in the community center and the villages of Allenvile and Dutchtown were under voluntary evacuation orders.

Allenville's evacuation was due to high water; the evacuation of Dutchtown was due to rising water in Hubble Creek and fears that levees downstream could be breached.

Inside Cape Girardeau, residents on Greenbrier Drive and Nottingham Lane were asked to leave their homes because of the potential failure of an earthen dam in Lakewood Estates subdivision, city spokeswoman Michelle Hahn said.

Mudslides closed Giboney Avenue, Elm Street, Dumais Drive and Timon Way.

As evening fell, the city had been divided into quadrants, police, fire and public works crews were assessing streets and barricading dangerous spots and the city had partially activated its emergency operations plan, Hahn said.

The LaSalle retention basin overflowed about 11 a.m., the Osage Community Centre playing fields were flooded and the entire city drainage system was maxed out throughout the day, Cook said.

Emergency crews responded to at least four water rescues from stranded vehicles, including two near Delta, one on Highway 34 north of Burfordvile and one on Highway 25 between Dutchtown and Gordonville.

Firefighters responded to one home in Delta where a mother with her three children, aged 8, 3 and 3 months, were loaded into boats as their house was surrounded, said John Sachen, a fire training official. "The whole area is flooded west of the railroad tracks," he said.

Capt. Ruth Ann Dickerson of the Cape Girardeau County Sheriff's Department said Dutchtown also suffered significant flooding. Evacuees were taken to the Delta Community Center, where the Southeast Missouri chapter of the Red Cross opened one of its three shelters.

In Jackson, the police spent much of their time closing streets. Sgt. Steve Green got drenched setting up barricades.

"We put those up there so they don't get their vehicles stuck in the high water. It's there to tell them it's a safety issue, he said.

Green said City Park was inundated, as was the low area around East Main Street and Shawnee Boulevard.

"I hope people don't try driving over the low-lying bridges. Our parks are fully flooded. We've had so much rain. This isn't anything normal," he said.

By midday, the city had run out of barricades for flooded streets.

Rescues didn't just include people. Jackson officer Ryan Medlin retrieved a dog and her puppies from a yard filling with water on Jefferson Street. After taking the adult dog to safety, he heard the puppies in the doghouse and returned through the water to retrieve them, Green said.

n Bollinger County. Rain started falling in Bollinger County before it reached Cape Girardeau County, and flooding cut Marble Hill in half by midmorning.

Most of the major highways in the county were closed for at least part of the day.

"We are just trying to make sense of it all," McElrath said. "We are trying to relay medicine and evacuating people out of Glenallen as night falls and electricity fades in different places. We are trying to get everybody situated in the shelters."

McElrath had lost count of the number of water rescues and calls for other assistance emergency officials received during the day.

The county's emergency operations plan was activated, and the Missouri State Highway Patrol, the water patrol and the conservation department had sent crews to help.

Perhaps the most difficult moment of the day came when an older couple, driving near the Woodland school, misjudged the depth of water on the road, McElrath said. "They went ahead and drove off into the river anyway. They had to be rescued by the conservation agents. That gave us a scare."

At about 10 p.m. Tuesday, crews were trying to rescue 23 people stranded in the April Hills subdivision near Zalma because of flooding on the Castor River.

n Scott County. Northern Scott County caught the brunt of the storm, with Scott City closing Main Street in several places and ditches along Interstate 55 north of Benton running full and threatening to cover the roadway.

Motorists in Scott County were being careful, Sheriff Rick Walter said, reporting no incidents that required a water rescue. "People are very aware of the situation."

Walters did lend a four-wheel all-terrain vehicle to emergency crews trying to sandbag around a house on Route EE that was threatened by rising waters.

In Scott City, a mudslide near Neeley forced the closure of Route AB. "The bluff is coming down and we are just going to have to let it fall," dispatcher Tawana Presley said.

Main Street was flooded, as were numerous side streets, she said. Crews from the special road district, the fire department and reserve officers were called in to work through the night to keep up with road closings and prepare for possible rescues of drivers who failed to obey the barricades, she said.

n Perry County. Perry County Sheriff Gary Schaaf said the biggest problem he was seeing at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday was "people driving through the water on Route B. We've had to rescue a couple of them."

He was about to close U.S. 61, right at the border of Perry and Cape Girardeau counties.

"The water at Apple Creek is at the bottom of the bridge," he said. "And on Route A in south Perry County, where is goes east to Frohna, is about to go under. We have numerous county roads underwater."

He also reported several mudslides on Highway 51 near McBride.

On Tuesday evening, he tapped Biehle, Mo., and East Perry firefighters to rescue an elderly man from his Apple Creek Lane home, where water was encroaching.

In Perryville, public works director Jeremy Freeman said storm water invaded the city sewer system, resulting in overflows in various parts of town. And while few roads were closed, he said, "there is a lot of standing water in the highways and on the roads."

The worst problems were in the hilly areas of the rural county roads, said Bill Jones, assistant fire chief of Perryville. Numerous people were either stranded in their homes, surrounded by high water or cut off from reaching their abodes.

"The biggest part of the day has been trying to map out roads that are open and alternate ways to get in and out for emergency crews," Jones said.

Staff writers Candice Hale-Davis and Matt Sanders contributed to this report.

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126

pmcnichol@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 127