June 28, 2006
11:40: Region hit with widespread flooding
By Brendan Scott
Times Herald-Record
bscott@th-record.com
Deerpark - Myers Grove is under a mandatory evacuation that started at 11 a.m. today.
Eddy Farm has evacuated 60 guests and is going to place them at Port Jervis High School, where the city has set up an emergency shelter. The shelter will also house the Myers Grove evacuees.
Emergency services personnel from around Orange County are flowing into flood-prone areas along the Delaware River and its tributaries to assist in rescues and evacuations.
Most of the county's resources were focused on the river town of Port Jervis, where waters broke the city's 18-foot flood stage shortly before 9 a.m. today, Emergency Services Commissioner Walt Koury said. Port Jervis Mayor Gary Lopriore had already declared a state of emergency and ordered mandatory evacuations in a couple of low-lying wards, sending at least 26 people to a makeshift shelter at Port Jervis High School.
"The fire companies are doing what they can to pump out the streets, but, with the rate of rise, that's going to be difficult to maintain," Koury said.
It was expected that rising water would force officials to close the Tri-State Bridge, which fords the Neversink and links Port Jervis to Interstate 84. Sheriff Carl DuBois had assigned three deputies to assist in response.
The Thruway Authority has announced that Interchange 1 (Port Jervis-US 6) on Interstate 84 westbound is closed to drivers.
Koury was headed to Deerpark Town Hall, where there was growing concern that the rush of water down the Delaware from torrential downpours upstate would prevent water from escaping the Neversink.
Earlier this morning, Orange County Executive Ed Diana opened the county's emergency services center in Goshen to help coordinate response locally.
Meanwhile, water rescue teams from Sparrowbush and Silver Lake had been dispatched to Sullivan County to help pull residents from swollen streams in and around Livingston Manor, where waters were rising faster. In response to another request for help, volunteer firefighters from Maybrook had been sent to the Delaware County to lend a hand in the Village of Walton.
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