Local businesses still cleaning up after Tuesday’s storm

The water has receded and most of the roads that were washed out by the deluge of rain on August 22 have been repaired, but for some local business owners the clean up continues.

Businesses on Cairns Road and Cairns Crescent in Huntsville’s west end were the worst hit by the series of thunderstorms that dropped more than 100mm – one local personal weather station (PWS) measured the rainfall at more than 200mm – in just a few hours.

It’s the second time this year the area has flooded. In the spring, a beaver dam off Kitchen Road South let go, swamping the area with about 18 inches of water. This time around, the water crested two feet in some areas.

For small business owner Rob Addison, who rents shop space in a building on Cairns Crescent for The Addison Wood Company, a second flood in one year is devastating for his new endeavour and he’s hoping his business will be able to survive it.

The garage door to the shop was pushed in by the force of the water and once that happened, “the water was just freely flowing through,” said Addison. Part of the issue was the sheer volume of water – it reached a depth of about 18 inches in the shop compared to four inches during the spring flood – but that was exacerbated by traffic going by.

“Some were respectful and drove through slowly but the big trucks were just flying through. Some of them created a foot and a half wave and I’m guessing that’s what pushed in the door was those big waves,” said Addison. “I parked my personal vehicle in the middle of the road to stop people from flying by and I was worried about the road washing out.” Calls to the Town of Huntsville to have someone close the road went unanswered, but four hours later a barricade was placed where there was a washout.

“I can’t blame it on the Town – we also got a record amount of rain, it was pretty much a whole summer’s worth in a day. I know the Town was overwhelmed but some contact would have been fantastic.”

Addison’s fiancée Trish Steele set up a GoFundMe page to help the business recover from the damage. The page reads: “As a small business, only in its second year, we weren’t ready for this. We can’t go weeks without work as we clean up, put back the pieces and replace what has been lost. This is a huge hit to our family. Right now we are trying to put together the funds to get us through the next few weeks, to finish the projects that our customers are currently waiting for.”

In the same building, Mitch Friend was dismayed to find the floor of his gym, CrossFit Hatchet, submerged.

He, too, put a plea on GoFundMe for help, and shared a video of the flooding on his personal Facebook page that was shared widely thanks to the international CrossFit community (see below).

“There was so much water. It was devastating in the moment. It’s so hard to comprehend the clean up when it’s just coming in,” said Friend, who is both owner and the only employee of the business, coaching members on functional fitness and high intensity workouts.

“The immediate reaction was game over, there’s no way I can recover. Now that we’ve had an amazing team of people (helping with clean up), we’ll be back by next week. It’s so incredible,” said Friend. “I had a hard time reaching out to people and then I just said, screw it, I need some help, and people came through.”

Current and former members of the gym and friends have been stopping by to help with the clean up, drop off food for those doing the work, and leave donations to help out with recovery costs. Friend was also getting messages of support from CrossFit owners around the world, including Greece, Italy, Australia, and Iceland.

Across the road at CRS Contractors Rental Supply, staff were also dealing with the second flood this year – ironically, a crew happened to be there working to fix some of the damage caused by the last round when the flooding began, said manager Phil Betts.

“We watched it get progressively higher and higher,” said Betts. “It’s been many years since I’ve seen it rain that hard. The drain couldn’t handle the volume of water. Once it got to the door, it came in fast and furious… At the end of the day, we had two feet of water in the store; there was about 16 inches last time.”

Thanks to the flooding in the spring, staff knew where to focus their attention, moving power tools off the floor and taking files out of lower cabinet drawers.

“It’s sad. It’s maddening and frustrating. We are back to square one with a long, drawn-out restoration stage,” said Betts. “We aren’t sure who to pin blame on. The Town’s drainage isn’t equipped to handle that magnitude (of water) and the beaver dam needs to be addressed as well.”

The store is in a unique position – while dealing with their own flooding, they’ve remained open to provide equipment to others in the community who have also been affected by the flooding.

Across town, So Many Looks on the corner of John Street and Cann Street was also impacted by the heavy rain, although it wasn’t as devastating as the flooding it experienced in 2013 when it had to close for months and changed its business model from used books to women’s fashion and accessories as a result.

“We had about two inches of water – I’ll take that over two feet any day,” said the store’s owner, Debbie Mannerow. “It came so fast that the drains can’t take the water away.” Staff worked quickly to get stock, particularly new inventory in a storage room, off the floor. Thanks to the help of friends and family, the store was able to re-open today at noon.

Mannerow said she’s frustrated by the poor drainage in the area – “Four years ago they did some work but they didn’t fix the problem. The piping as I understand it is not big enough, but we’re so saturated with water I’m not sure that would have made a difference anyway.” – and also with drivers not slowing down through flood waters.

“The most frustrating was when I watched people coming down Cann Street in pick up trucks going full tilt just to see how big they could make the waves,” she said. “They thought it was a riot, even after I yelled at them to stop. How disheartening to think that you could care so little that every time you go by you are flooding my store.” She said that in future, she would hope that the street could be barricaded to prevent more damage to businesses.

To the east of town at Deerhurst Resort, the damage was outside after a washout on Deerhurst Drive flooded part of hole seven on the Lakeside golf course, leaving a swath of sand and rocks behind.

“Most of the golf course damage was typical of a heavy rain with sand washing down from the edges of bunkers and gravel cart paths washed out, maybe a little more severe than usual,” said Andrew Nieder, Director and Superintendent of Golf at Deerhurst. “The bunkers will take the better part of a week to get them back to where they were.”

The biggest clean up, though, will be on number seven. “The road washed onto the fairway, so we need to get that off the grass as quickly as possible otherwise the grass dies, and then the front nine on Lakeside will be back in play.” Nieder was optimistic that would happen within two days.

Deerhurst Drive was still closed for repairs today with traffic being rerouted through Hidden Valley.

Debris from a washout on Deerhurst Drive ended up on hole 7 on Deerhurst’s Lakeside course

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