August 3, 2022
Come hell or high water
Around Town
CREC sponsors five students at CYCLE. Pg. 3 Residents and businesses in the city of St. Charles with flood damage reminded of permit requirements. Pg. 4 A SENIOR MOMENT. Pg. 4
Record rainfall floods St. Charles County. Pg. 6
Features
St. Charles County emergency personnel working through exhaustion and under dire, stressful circumstances during last week’s flash flooding.
Photo courtesy St. Charles County Ambulance District
St. Charles County emergency personnel fought exhaustion and dangerous conditions performing rescues and evacuations during record flood event By Brett Auten It was all hands on deck. After more than a foot of rainfall soaked much of St. Charles County early last week, emergency personnel bandied together to prevent even more. St. Charles County’s 911 and other regional call centers were bombarded with calls. Interstate 70 was shut down, and County Executive Steve Ehlmann declared a State of Emergency in the county because of the torrential rain and flooding.
According to records from St. Charles County Emergency Communications, between midnight and 11 a.m., July 26, 87 persons were evacuated from homes or businesses in St. Charles County. The St. Charles County Police Department received 148 calls to 911 and dispatched officers to 162 incidents. Fire and EMS Dispatch received 129 calls to 911 and responded to 224 incidents. Jason Meinershagen is the Deputy Chief at Central County Fire & Rescue. He has lived in the area since 1995 and been with
the fire district since 1998. Meinershagen has participated in the response to nearly a dozen flood events in that time, but this one was a challenge in many ways. “I’ve never seen anything like this particular event,” Meinershagen said. “It presented numerous challenges that were unique in type and scope. We quickly found ourselves strapped for resources countywide. As 911 calls literally flooded our dispatch center, the sheer volume of incidents stackSee ‘WATER’ page 2
Serving St. Louis, St. Charles and Lincoln Counties | FREE Online at mycnews.com | Vol. 24 No. 31 | 636-379-1775
Recipe, Movie & Sudoku. Pg. F-1 CLASSIFIEDS AND HOME & GARDEN. Pg. F-2 /F-3 Moore On Life, Yeggs & Crossword. Pg. F-4
Weather FRIDAY Partly Cloudy 88/72 SATURDAY Sunny 91/74 SUNDAY Partly Cloudy 91/73