BLUEFIELD, W.Va. — Heavy rain on Memorial Day caused flash flooding in Bluefield and high water in parts of McDowell County.
The National Weather Service said as much as 3.5 inches of rain hit Monday morning in Bluefield. A flash flood watch remained in effect until 3 p.m. Monday.
The weather service also issued a flood warning for parts of McDowell County until 5 p.m. Monday where 1.5 to 3 inches of rain had fallen by noon. Areas reporting high water included Welch, Gary, War, Northfork, Davy, Bradshaw, Keystone, Anawalt, Kimball and Coalwood.
Bluefield City Manager Cecil Marson said his city’s storm drains were unable to handle that much rain that quickly.
“Storm drains are fine but they’re not built for this amount of rain–it hit us pretty good,” Marson said. “Unfortunately we got hit pretty solid down here.”
The City of Bluefield put a public notice on its Facebook page:
“Due to major flooding issues throughout the City of Bluefield, WV, residents are encouraged for their own safety to limit travel today as storm water crews work to reduce the high levels of water throughout the city. The city thanks you for your patience during this time.”
Marson said he believed downtown buildings would survive the high water without much major damage. He said a few communities surrounding the downtown will have plenty of residential basement flooding.
“There are a few homes in a couple of areas that have had some pretty high water that have gotten up to their porches and we’ve had some cars that have gotten covered up in a couple of spots but it’s predominately basement flooding that’s the big issue that we’ll have to wrestle with,” Marson said.
The city started getting calls about the high water Monday morning. Marson said they jumped into action.
“We all live here and when there’s an issue everybody gets up and gets after it,” Marson said. “The priority is is to make sure everybody is okay and we’ll mess with the cleanup afterwards.”