Cement brick mason Steve Banfield of the Covington Public Works Department cleans gravel and torn-up asphalt off the intersection of Montague and Amsterdam roads.
City crews cleaning up damage from overnight storm
COVINGTON, Ky. - Crews from the Covington Public Works Department worked throughout the night and all day today cleaning up damage across the city from torrential rains and heavy wind overnight.
Damage included fallen trees and limbs, ripped up pavement, flooded intersections, and small slides of mud and gravel at spots almost too numerous to mention, Public Works Director Rick Davis said.
"It's everywhere," Davis said.
Davis said he had three crews still out early this afternoon, cutting up trees, shoveling up mud and gravel, and using a backhoe and a Bobcat to clean up torn-up asphalt.
Much of the flooding occurred in the low spots of the Peaselburg and Lewisburg neighborhoods in the shadow of hills.
Weather stations are reporting more than 5 inches of rain fell in 24 hours on ground that was already saturated.
Crews were first dispatched around midnight to barricade streets that had several feet of water washing down them, Davis said.
"There's not a whole lot you can do once the flood comes," Davis said. "It was like a tsunami of water. It was crazy."
Several streets remained blocked off as of this posting, and cities across Greater Cincinnati reported similar problems.
Davis said he believed the flooding in Covington would have been worse if the City had not spent the last few years working with Sanitation District No. 1 and others to build four detention ponds near Monte Casino. Three more ponds in that area are in the planning stages, as is a project that would help detain much of the water washing off the hills above Lewisburg.
|
|
|
Driver Danny Peters, left, and driver Jim Hammond shovel heavy muck off the intersection of Lewis and Baker streets into the bucket of a Bobcat driven by tech 3 Richard Baucum.
|
|
|
|
Cement brick mason Steve Banfield dumps a load of asphalt into a dump truck driven by mechanic Todd Marshall.
|
|
|
|
One of many trees knocked over by the storm across Greater Cincinnati. This one is on Second Street in Historic Licking Riverside.
|
|
|
|
The intersection of Lewis and Baker, pre-cleanup.
|
# # #