CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Children impacted by the June flood will have one more opportunity this summer to participate in a free summer camp hosted by the West Virginia National Guard.
The Summit Bechtel Reserve in Fayette County will be the site for Saturday’s camp. The camp is for kids ages 5 to 18.
The Guard began offering camps to kids earlier this month to kids affected by the flood in an effort to ease the emotional stress at home, according to Lt. Col. Melissa Shade, state public affairs officer for the National Guard.
“We’ve seen a lot of kids just running around, playing and just having a little bit of normalcy for just one day and that was our goal,” Shade told MetroNews.
The first camp was co-hosted with the YMCA of the Kanawha Valley earlier this month at Coonskin Park. The second camp was in Lewisburg. Water rockets, military displays, a rock wall and an obstacle course were among the activities for kids.
“I’m amazed at the resiliency and the positive attitude that West Virginians have in helping each other and so I have definitely seen that at all these camps — people pitching in to help each other,” Shade said.
Friday’s camp at the Summit Bechtel Reserve will get started at 8:30 a.m., Shade said.
“It is an amazing facility. They have BMX bike, archery, the zip lines, the sustainable tree house, so it will be an amazing experience for these kids,” she said.
Shade said these camps also prepare students for the upcoming school year.
“We gave them a back pack and we had some school supplies that were donated,” she said. “We did try to get them some things that would be helpful for them to get back into school.”
The National Guard is hoping to host another camp for flood impacted children sometime in the fall, Shade said.