Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 10, 1994 TAG: 9406170102
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: DRAPER LENGTH: Medium
The costs do not include road cleanup by the Virginia Department of Transportation, which still was under way in the Draper, Allisonia and Hiwassee areas.
The series of slides that followed heavy rains Tuesday night closed a five-mile section of New River Trail State Park, the linear hiking, bicycling and horseback-riding trail that stretches from Grayson County to the town of Pulaski.
``It's going to take months to get the whole mess cleaned up, but we hope to have the area secured and have those five miles of the park open within a week,'' said Gary Waugh, with the Department of Conservation and Recreation in Richmond.
Park Manager Mark Hufeisen said Thursday afternoon that a path about 10 feet wide had been made through most of the 12 or more slides that day. Park crews and a private contractor, Jeff Worrell of Draper, were working on it.
Now that the workers can at least move along the trail, a department engineer was to come from Richmond today to assess the damage.
Hufeisen said rain that continued through Thursday made the earth heavier and more difficult to move. Another problem was that the banks along the trail still are not stable, with small amounts of soil coming loose at times.
He said that section of the park probably would be available to the public again by the weekend, although anybody walking through it would come out muddy.
``It'll be passable, anyway,'' he said, adding that visitors should stay away from the loose edges along some of the trail.
The entire section of the trail inundated with mud and debris was in Pulaski County, near its border with Wythe County. That area got 6 inches of rain in three hours. ``It seemed like it just sat right there,'' Hufeisen said.
``Things are looking better over there. It's still a muddy mess,'' Pulaski County Emergency Services Coordinator Stan Crigger said Thursday.
He said poles were pushed through banks to help stabilize them, and electrical power was restored.
Crigger said most of the property damage was to four homes and a car. The four homes that had major damage remained unsafe for occupancy Thursday. Mud pushed one of them off its foundation.
New River Trail State Park crews still were cleaning up debris left from February's ice storms when this latest weather hit.
by CNB