Some bags, dense with frozen floodwater, weighed as much as 50 pounds. “Now, they are sandbricks,” said Jakob Budge, 17, a volunteer from the Mormon congregation in Fenton.
At first, the youth said, his muscles ached from the repetition of lifting and passing. But determination took over. People along the chain peeled off their jackets and wiped sweat from their brows even in the frigid air. An hour and a half later, they cheered as the last of the bags from the back of one home left their hands.
“We’re done, that’s it! Go get some water,” yelled Budge’s father, Phil Budge, 42. But he quickly corrected himself, “What I mean is, we’re done here.”
When rising floodwater swamped the region nearly four weeks ago, volunteers quickly mobilized with a sense of urgency and purpose to fill and stack sandbags in an effort to save homes and businesses.
Though not quite as glorious, the tedious cleanup work has been steadily and quietly underway.
In the four metro counties affected by the December floods — Franklin, Jefferson, St. Charles and St. Louis — almost 98 percent of the sandbags have been picked up, said Barb Sturner, a spokeswoman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency regional office in Kansas City.
Crews had removed 859 tons of sandbags by the end of last week, Sturner said. The much larger task of removing all other flood debris, from ruined wallboard to household chemicals and appliances, is more than half done.
Area fire departments and districts direct volunteers to areas of need. The United Way of Greater St. Louis, AmeriCorps and American Red Cross also continue to track needs and coordinate volunteers.
Sturner said, “There has been a terrific effort by everyone — volunteers and communities — to rally, roll up their sleeves and help each other.”
2,500 sandbags
Fenton Mayor Mike Polizzi said most of the sandbags and flood debris have been picked up in the city of about 4,000 residents. Volunteers had hurriedly stacked sandbags to protect homes as the Meramec River rose quickly, but more than 30 were reached by water, and a few homes in the old town section near the river may have to be demolished.
“Some got 10 feet of water,” he said, “You can’t stop that with sandbags.”
One homeowner, Jana Gottlieb, 60, said despite a wall of sandbags, her finished basement ended up with 5½ feet of water from a Meramec River creek behind her home. She and her husband had to remove everything down to the studs and treat the walls for mold.
“You get to the point after the flood and think, ‘How am I ever going to clean this up’?” Gottlieb said. “What you have to do is trust that someone will come and help you.”
Gottlieb said she has received assistance from Lutheran and Baptist church groups, who helped remove damaged furniture and drywall. The volunteers who descended Saturday on her subdivision were from nine area Mormon churches sent by the Saline Valley Fire Protection District.
The volunteers carried 2,500 sandbags from her backyard to the curb for pickup.
A simple “thank you” is no longer simple, Gottlieb said. “I have said ‘thank you’ so much in the past three weeks that I never want to use those words so easily because I know what they really mean,” she said. “There’s just not enough words to begin to tell them how much it meant to us.”
Recovery agencies have asked residents and business owners to put ruined items along roadsides in separate piles for general debris, including wallboard and furniture; cleaning fluids and other household hazardous waste; appliances; electronic waste; containers of propane and other fuels; and yard waste, such as tree limbs. Anyone who needs help in hauling and separating can arrange for volunteers to assist by calling 211, the general metro help line.
Sturner said about 12,500 appliances and electronic devices — freezers and computers, among others — have been separated for recycling through contracts. “The good news is that they won’t be going to landfills,” she said. National Guard soldiers and clean-up contractors are also recycling sand clean enough for reuse.
About 1,750 homes
The lower Meramec River reached record flood levels on Dec. 30 and Dec. 31 from Pacific to Arnold, with crests from one to four feet higher than the flood of 1982. Record rainfall of eight or more inches over three days and across wide areas of Missouri powered the flood.
The Mississippi and Missouri rivers also rose to within five feet of their high levels in 1993.
A levee failed near West Alton, affecting more than 100 homes, but the most widespread damage was along the Meramec, where the flood caused at least minor damage to at least 1,100 dwellings, nearly 270 of which may have to be demolished, according to unofficial reports. All told, flooding affected about 1,750 dwellings in the metro area on both sides of the Mississippi.
On Thursday, President Barack Obama issued a disaster declaration for 33 Missouri counties, including the four metro counties and several neighboring counties. Illinois officials still are preparing their damage reports for consideration by the White House.
Doug Larsen, a bishop with the Mormon congregation in Fenton, helped coordinate Saturday’s effort to remove sandbags in the Winter Valley subdivision. He said they had planned to do the work two weeks ago but rain and a dangerous windchill postponed the effort.
By the time the volunteers were done, Larsen said they had moved about 10 to 15 tons of sandbags from five homes to the curb in just two hours.
The reason why the elder Budge brought his teenage sons Jakob and Ethan Budge to help, he said, was simple. “Because we were asked to,” he said. “When you are asked to help, you help.”
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