PLAINFIELD, Vt. — Volunteers, some with heavy equipment, shoveled river silt and mud from roads, homes, yards and driveways and removed flood-ravaged items from homes Friday in one of the Vermont communities hardest hit by flooding from the remnants of Hurricane Beryl.
Former students of a now retired school principal, whose home and yard were among those damaged, showed up to help.
“I think as a community we all got to come together and give a hand and receive nothing but just giving the love back that he’s given the community and to the school,” said Dillon Mears, 33, of Owen Bradley. Some wore t-shirts emblazoned with the word “love,” a message that Bradley and his wife Jane spread.
The couple’s son flew in Friday morning on a red eye from Oakland, California, and quickly went to work with others.
“This is how we are. You know, there’s people over there helping out, as soon as we’re done here, we’re going to help everybody else out,” said Adrian Bradley, 35. “That’s Vermont. It’s a small state, 600,000 people, we know everybody, you help your neighbors.”
Gov. Phil Scott said Friday it’ll take several more days to fully assess damage from flooding caused by the remnants of Hurricane Beryl, but he said Vermont is better positioned to recover quickly after enduring heartbreak, federal red tape and an extensive cleanup from massive floods exactly a year ago.
“We can all use what we learned last year to quickly strengthen our response, and that starts with getting homes, businesses and communities clean and dry as quickly as possible,” Scott told reporters at a briefing in Berlin.
He praised the resilience of Vermonters who are accustomed to making do without government help in rural areas, but also urged them to take time to report damage and not to be afraid to ask for assistance.
Beryl’s remnants dumped more than 6 inches (15 centimeters) of rain in just a few hours Wednesday and Thursday on parts of Vermont, destroying and damaging homes, knocking out bridges, cutting off towns and retraumatizing a state where some people are still awaiting assistance from the last catastrophic floods that hit a year ago to the day. / AP