11/19/03
When going to work yesterday at about 8 AM, I noticed that the river was pretty high, but I really didn't think anything of it. Then, school let out and all of the parents had to either go get their kids or have some body go get them, so I figured it must be getting bad. Jeannie even had to get her grandma b/c she lives (lived) right next to the river, so she got her and put her back with us in produce. So, we all worked for a while and everyone was using the phones to find out what was going on, then at about eleven, Norma (my manager) was going to lunch and she told me it was getting really bad outside and she was taking me home. We were leaving, I was glad, but Danny (store owner) said that I had to stay and that noone was allowed outside of the store.
Well, I went to get milk and when I came back, dirty, brown, water was coming through the produce doors!!! I was thinking.. "well,what the?!?" Then Danny started yelling, "The water's coming through the doors!!!!!" Everyone was like "duh." I was afraid we were all going to get electrocuted because there were extention cords in the water. Kim (the cashier) started going hysterical while all the guys in the meat dept. tried sweeping the water back out which wasn't helping b/c there wasn't anything blocking the flow of water. We had almost forgotten about poor grandma being back there alone in produce, so Jeannie and I got her and stuck her in the break room, but water was seeping in there too.

Water started flowing into the automatic doors at the front of the store. We had to get all of the customers out of the store, but some were trapped. By this time the whole store was surrounded by water, and the whole place was filling up fast. All of the drains were backing up, so water was coming out of the floor, and also the bay doors. We had to get the cardboard displays off of the floor and onto pallets. The lights started flickering so Danny FINALLY turned all of power off. We opened the back bay door and there was water everywhere!!! It looked like a big brown lake all over the town. There was a kid trapped on the steps of the ROTC building, but he got out and was ok. We watched a car get completely turned around by the raging water. The owner was inside the store helping us move stuff. By this time, every inch of the floor was covered with 3 inches of water! It had stopped raining though :p So, then we had to clean up....not pleasant, but at least none of us got hurt, not even grandma. We put her in the back office and gave her food from the deli. She even went to sleep, lol! I bet we swept thousands of gallons of water out of there, and we were all soaked, ewwwww! It was hard work. People who aren't regular employees helped work, and the boys stayed for 24 hours w/out sleep. We had the water swept out, the place cleaned & disinfected, and checked by the heath department all by 3:00 this afternoon when we opened. We had to open b/c it's the only store in town. A lot of people lost their homes though. Jeannie & her grandma lived next to the river and their places are in bad shape. :( I'm very glad I live on a hill!!!! I had never seen anything like this my whole life. There is even a trailor in someone's yard that wasn't there before...a bridge was washed out, park's under water. WEll, sorry for so much typing. Floods are SCARY!!!

Ive never had a flood before.. (except for when the pool exploded and water went everywhere and even leaked into the house, hahaha that was awesome)

I am glad that nobody got electrocuted in the store. I used to live in Florida and we, during hurricaine season, always try to prepare if we ever were in a hurricaine but thank godness we never had one hurricaine at all, before, during, & after we left Florida to make the move permantely to Tennessee!!