County schools escape major storm damage

By Jason R. Mullins

Despite the deluge of heavy rains from Sunday’s storm, officials with the Carter County School System are reporting only minor issues at a few of their facilities. Interim School Director Dr. Kevin Ward and Facilities Supervisor Phillip Nave both reported that the system escaped the same kind of flooding found in other parts of the area.

On Monday, Nave and school officials began the process of assessing the current status of the 16 schools in Carter County, along with the central office building in Elizabethton. As of early afternoon, however, Nave said that he had only found minor problems across the county.

The current roofing project at Hampton Elementary did lead to some minor leaks being reported in some portions of the building. Ward commented, “We did have some rooms in the school that saw some water from leaks in the roof, but we did not receive any reports of damage to computers or other equipment inside the building.”

At Range Elementary School near Watauaga, the heavy rainfall experienced Sunday afternoon around 4 p.m. caused some water to enter underneath the doors of the facility. School officials quickly resolved the problems by using squeegies to remove the water.

The only other location to report any issues from the storm was at the central office building on Academy Street in Elizabethton. Nave said that one of the downstairs offices had some water in it. He believes the water entered the office from one of the downspouts located on the outside wall. “It looks as if the rain was so heavy that the storm gutters and downspouts just couldn’t handle it and the water entered the office. Fortunately, none of the office equipment was damaged,” said Nave.

Ward compared yesterday’s rainfall to the historic flooding that occurred in Carter County in January of 1998. “When you look at what happened in 1998, we had three feet of water in the lower level of the central office. This is certainly nowhere near what we experienced then,” he said.

Ward said he does not expect yesterday’s heavy rainfall to cause any issues with the start of the 2012-2013 school year, which is scheduled to begin for students on Monday, Aug. 13.