Recognizing Rowan Countians Who Helped with Swift Water Rescues in Southeastern Kentucky
This month we were joined by Governor Andy Beshear and Senior Advisor Rocky Adkins to honor several first responders whose heroic efforts in the Eastern Kentucky floods resulted in the rescue of approximately 100 Kentuckians.
These individual’s exceptional performance, professionalism, and dedication to duty reflect great credit upon themselves, the first responder community, Rowan County, and the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
Below is a write up of the events precipitating these awards:
Heavy rains fell in eastern Kentucky on the night of Wednesday, July 27th and continued into the early hours of the following morning, causing a historic flash flooding emergency. This made roads impassable and displaced hundreds of residents, while trapping hundreds of others.
On that morning of Thursday, July 28th, 2022, Rowan County Emergency Management Director Jarred Moore received a request for mutual aid from KYEM Area Director Chris Hecker to deploy any available swift water assets to assist with the rescue and evacuation efforts. Director Moore immediately set out to establish communications, assess needs and receive orders in Hazard. The route became impassable due to high waters in Jackson where KY 476 meets KY 15. There he met fellow Rowan Countians with the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources Law Enforcement Division who were already on scene and assisting with evacuations.
Director Moore then communicated back home to rally units from the Morehead Fire Department and the Farmers Volunteer Fire Department. The Route 377 Volunteer Fire Department’s swift water response team remained in Rowan County as a reserve force, as our community was still under a flood watch at that time. After readying two boats crewed with swift water technicians and operators, our teams arrived mid-afternoon to begin assisting in rescue and evacuation of residents of the downtown Jackson and the Quicksand community, working along KY 2464 and KY 2472 and pulling residents from the water as they went.
At approximately 1900 hours, it became apparent that the waters of Troublesome Creek in Jackson would soon crest over KY 15 into Fish Pond Loop, where many residents still remained in homes as flood waters had never before crossed that high-banked road. Rowan County assets in conjunction with many other agencies from across the Commonwealth quickly set upon the neighborhood to evacuate the families before they became trapped or swept away.
As nightfall set in, many crews were ordered home when adverse weather conditions including thunderstorms, torrential rains, coupled with the low visibility made it too dangerous to continue to operate in the torrid waters. The majority-volunteer crews from Rowan County stayed in the water until approximately 0100 hours on Friday morning. In total, Rowan Countians played a hand in well over 100 rescues.
The following first responders from Rowan County were deployed that day to help in the rescue efforts.
Jarred Moore – Rowan County Emergency Management
From the Morehead Fire Department: Matt Brown, Cova Cornett, Christian Lewis, Jordon Clark
From the Farmers Volunteer Fire Department: Ryan Glover, Shane Ramey, Kyle Bowling, Adam Hicks
From the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources Law Enforcement Division: Andy Amburgey, Tim Brett, Brad Stafford
From the Clark County Fire Department: Sam Ray
These individual’s exceptional performance, professionalism, and dedication to duty reflect great credit upon themselves, the first responder community, Rowan County, and the Commonwealth of Kentucky.