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Residents face task of cleaning up

BY BRENT STEWART, THE SOUTHERN
Posted: Wednesday, May 11, 2011

OLIVE BRANCH - Driving along Illinois 3 on Tuesday through the town of Olive Branch it was the same scene, house after house.

Yards were filled with piles of carpet, foam padding and drywall. Appliances sat in the yard drying out, and rows of clothes hung on lines.

The stench of river water was heavy in the air, and flies and gnats were beginning to become more than a little annoying.

A ring of dirt around most of the houses told how high floodwaters were in their particular area. On average, the stain was 2 to 3 feet high.

On Miller City Road, neighbors worked together to begin the tedious task of restoration.

Mickey Sissom's home took on 7 inches of water when flooding overtook his sandbag walls May 1. The water pressure was so great, it moved Sissom's sandbags 6 feet.

"Water just rushed in then. We couldn't hold it back," Sissom said.

Sissom has lived on Miller City Road since 1987. During the flood of 1993, he said he had to sandbag, but no water entered his house.

On Tuesday, friends and neighbors, Michael Randol and Clayton Greenley, helped Sissom tear out flooring and cut sheet rock above the water line.

"They're a lot of help to get everything done and dried out," Sissom said.

Miller City Road in front of Sissom's neighborhood was entirely flooded. The only way in and out was by boat.

Sissom and Greenley both said the water came in so quickly - above what was projected - that they were only able to move a few things out and prop some of their furniture off the floor.

"If we knew what we know now, it'd all been out," Greenley said.

Greenley - who has flood insurance - saw 27 inches of water in his house, which has a finished, partially above ground basement. His $5,000 flood insurance deductible had already been met just from the cost of replacing his heating and air conditioning systems.

In the neighborhood around Mel Grah Road, several block west of Illinois 3 closer to the Mississippi River, workers brought in rock to fortify and raise the roads. Each house was in the midst of clean-up.

Brooke Grace and Steve Matzker, two Southern Illinois University Carbondale photojournalism students, were in the neighborhood yesterday working on a class project and met several of the residents. On Tuesday, the students returned to the home of Phyllis and Barry Fry to volunteer their help to the elderly couple, who were unable to do much of the cleanup on their own.

Kevin McNulty, whose A-frame home on Mel Grah was partially submerged just over a week ago, was hosting contractors Tuesday afternoon, surveying the damage to the first floor of the house.

"We got about 12 inches of water on the first floor, so that's all the sub-floor, drywall, air conditioning ducts, air conditioner and everything in the garage, but that's probably about it," he said. "It's just general cleanup, whatever a foot of water will do to the inside of your house."

McNulty considers himself lucky. He's got insurance; now it's just a matter of drying out.

"If you're going to live on the water, sometimes you're going to get your feet wet," McNulty said.