Flooding posed a potential this week as a result of rising temperatures and snowmelt as well as rain on Thursday; the National Weather Service issued a flood warning. It came as no surprise, then, on Friday morning when there was some minor flooding in low-lying areas in Richland County.
Smart Road near state Route 39 in Lucas was closed early in the morning and was reopened at approximately 2:15 p.m. It represented the most significant flooding.
Flooding issues prompted Crestview Schools Superintendent Scott Will to call a two-hour delay Friday morning due to swelling creeks rushing over some low-lying roads, as well as some water covering state Routes 96 and 13. Will said a great amount of snow in a short amount of time combined with a quick thaw caused waters to overflow.
“This morning we had a few roads flooded over that our buses had to redirect for, which slows down the process of picking up our kids,” said Will. “We wanted to take that into account and have a little more daylight so our bus drivers can see better which roads are flooded and reroute accordingly.”
“This winter has been one extreme or the other,” said Will. “It’s been relentless.”
High waters swept over a handful of roads in Shelby, but according to Shelby Police Chief Charlie Roub those waters had already begun to recede as of approximately 8:30 a.m.
“The water is going down, we’ve been watching that through the stream gauge,” said Roub. “It reached a high point around 6:15 a.m. and it’s been going down pretty quickly. We’ve lost about two feet in the river in the last couple hours, so we expect that’s going to continue.”
Roub attributed the minor flooding to snow and ice accumulated not only in the streets but also the catch basin, noting that until those cleared the water could back up and cause flooding. Barriers were set up by police in a few areas of town as a reminder not to drive through the standing water.
“Water might not look like it’s moving very fast but six inches of water moving at a moderate pace can take you off your feet,” said Roub. “And it’s not exactly summertime so it’s going to be cold, and that creates other problems like hypothermia. The colder the water the worse it is to be in it, so people need to be careful of that.”
Roub said he did not anticipate any more flooding problems in Shelby unless the area receives rain.
“If the snow continues to go away slowly that’ll be a good thing,” he said. “We’ll just continue to monitor it and react accordingly.”
Lexington Administrative Assistant Brenda Wilson advised that Lexington did not experience much flooding as compared to previous instances. “There’s just a little flooding by the Lakeside Apartments where a nearby creek is, but U.S. 42 is passable,” she said.
She noted that that area has produced problems in the past, and that typically, the village uses that spot as a gauging point to see how bad the flooding is within the village.
Lexington Community Park, another area that typically experiences flooding had pooled water throughout the park.
Wilson said that Street Supervisor Roger Kilgore has researched weather forecasts and believes that this spring won’t be as warm as people are hoping for. “The Great Lakes have frozen, so the wind blowing over the lakes will affect our spring,” she said.
And in Bellville, there was very little evidence of flooding. Police Chief Ron Willey said there was only some pooling in low-lying areas.
“This winter has been one extreme or the other,” said Crestview Superintendent Scott Will. “It’s been relentless.”
