RAINELLE, W.Va. — On the wall of a brick building along U.S. 60 in the picturesque Greenbrier County town of Rainelle there’s a mural with the faces of four men painted in a straight line at the top, the four Rainelle residents who died in the June 2016 flood.
Second from the left is Ed Thompson, 85, a retiree of the Rainelle Kroger. He was in his brick house on 14th Street with Gerda, his wife of 65 years. on June 23, 2016 when it started to rain.
The Thompson’s son Keith was driving home from Charleston to Beckley on the West Virginia Turnpike that Thursday evening when the heavy rain slowed traffic. He wanted to check on his parents.
Keith made the call and his mother said the water from Sewell Creek had come up some but had gone back down. His mother assured him they were okay.
It kept raining. Keith called again. This time his mother told him the water was getting closer to the house. That’s the last time Keith Thompson spoke to his mother that night.
“They could see that it was up from Sewell Creek and that’s the last time I talked to them,” he said.
The power was off. Phones were down and there was very little cell phone service.
Keith finally got through to the assistant fire chief at around 12:30 a.m. on June 24. He told him the department was getting some boats to begin making rescue attempts–the first boat would head to 14th Street.
About six hours had passed since Keith had talked to his mother. He later learned the house had filled with three feet of water.
Keith soon heard from his friend the assistant chief.
“They didn’t see any action the first time they went by but they went by again and saw the curtain move. They shined a light in and saw mom and dad, dad had passed away,” Keith remembered.
The flood caused his father’s death but Ed Thompson did not drown.
“A lot of people think my dad drowned, he didn’t,” Keith said. “His death certificate says he died of hypothermia stress-related heart failure.”
The flood had claimed his life along with those of Gary Shumaker, Charles Omechinski II, and Denver Barker. Those of four of the 23 victims who lost their lives in the 2016 flood.
The Thompsons were in three feet of water for more than six hours and their body temperatures plummeted.
“When they got my mother in the hospital over in Summersville her body temperature was 87 and that’s after being wrapped in blankets in the back of an ambulance with the heat on high for 45 minutes,” Keith Thompson said. “My mother was a tough woman.”
Gerda Thompson, who retired as a school cook at Greenbrier West High School, was out of the hospital within two days.
Rainelle forever-changed
Rainelle sits at the bottom of Sewell Mountain. It was a bustling place when Keith Thompson was growing up. The Meadow River Lumber Company employed up to 500 people at a time in the 1960s plus Rainelle had U.S. 60, the Midland Trail, cutting through the heart of town with businesses lining each side of the highway.
The completion of Interstate 64 at Sam Black Church in 1988 hurt Rainelle taking much of the traffic from U.S. 60 to the interstate.
Rainelle was forever changed on that day 10 years ago. Those heavy rains caused both the Meadow River and Sewell Creek to flood. The flood destroyed houses and moved some mobile homes off their foundations. They jammed against a bridge creating a dam that backed up water even more.
Mayor Andy Pendleton was mayor back then too. There were a dozen or more of new homes built by service groups in the months after the flood but Pendleton estimates Rainelle lost about 200 residents as a result of the disaster. There are a lot of empty lots in the town today.
“It was so terrible to watch everything happen,” Pendleton told MetroNews in recent days. “I think Rainelle is different because we lived to survive it and we want to build it up a little bit better.”
Rainelle has a good, modern elementary school, several local businesses and restaurants. It also just opened a new trailhead on the Meadow River Trail. Pendleton is hopeful that will bring visitors.
Ten years after the flood, Pendleton said she most remembers how her community pulled together along with the help residents received.
“There was really a lot of influence with the flood, giving back and showing people how we care about them,” Pendleton said.
Back home on 14th Street
Gerda Thompson, 83, insisted on getting back into her house on 14th Street. Keith’s father had flood insurance so that helped with the gutting and rebuild.
Gerda got back into that house six weeks after the flood. She died just a few weeks later in October 2016 after suffering a massive stroke.
During those four months she talked some about those six hours she was in the floodwaters with her husband.
“She said he looked at her and she looked at him and she could see in his eyes it was not right and he just floated away a little bit and she grabbed him,” Keith Thompson said.
The house on 14th Street looks normal today. It has new owners. Keith Thompson thinks about what his parents suffered through that night and he has peace with it. He’s said he’s also thankful his mother was able to get back home a least for a few weeks before her own death.
“She had said over a long time, ‘I wanna live one day longer than your dad because nobody will take care of him like I will,’ and she was right,” Keith said.
All of the Rainelle flood victims will be remembered in a candlelight vigil this Friday, June 26. “A Decade of Remembrance” will begin at 7 p.m. on the Ranielle Town Hall stage.