Towns and cities from Addison to Caledonia counties were hit with 3 to 5 inches of rain late Wednesday, with some totals exceeding 6 and even 7 inches.
by Paul Heintz July 11, 2024, 9:16 am July 11, 2024, 7:23 pm
Updated at 7:22 p.m.
At least two people died as the remnants of Tropical Storm Beryl deluged central and northern Vermont late Wednesday and early Thursday, and more than 100 others were rescued from rising floodwaters.
At a press conference Thursday morning in Berlin, Gov. Phil Scott and Public Safety Commissioner Jennifer Morrison said the first death, in Peacham, appeared to be tied to the storm but offered few other details.
It’s VTDigger’s Fall Drive and our goal is to raise $75K by Sept. 22 to fund critical statewide journalism. VTDigger is made possible by the generosity of readers like you.
That afternoon, Vermont State Police identified the victim as Dylan Kempton, 33, of Peacham, whose UTV was found Wednesday night on its side in the South Peacham Brook. Rescue crews found Kempton’s body downstream just before midnight.
Later Thursday, Lyndonville Police Chief Jack Harris said that the body of a 73-year-old man had been recovered after his car was swept off a street flooded by the Passumpsic River. Harris identified the second the man as John Rice, of Concord.
Swiftwater teams conducted “dozens of rescues” overnight, Morrison said, and facilitated numerous evacuations. “We are still in active response mode and have multiple rescues ongoing in the Lyndonville area,” she said at the press conference, which took place at 10 a.m. According to Mike Cannon, the state’s urban search and rescue coordinator, the swiftwater teams rescued at least 118 people by boat.
Vermont National Guard members joined the state search and rescue teams to evacuate people from Barre, Northfield and Moretown, the Guard said in a press release, and out-of-state teams were also headed to Vermont, Cannon said.
flooding downtowns and prompting evacuations" width="1200" height="900" />
At least 54 state roads were closed as of 10 a.m., Secretary of Transportation Joe Flynn said at the press conference, and six bridges — in Barnet, Norton, Charleston, Moretown, Hinesburg and Starksboro — were “impinged.” He said he believed at least three of those had been destroyed. The state also suffered significant rail damage, including to Amtrak’s Vermonter route. Countless local roads were also damaged and closed.
Jason Batchelder, commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation, said that officials had been monitoring dams around the state and that the flood control dams along the Winooski River were “performing phenomenally.” One low-hazard dam, on Harvey’s Lake in Barnet, breached, Batchelder said, but that caused no significant damage.
Throughout central and northern parts of the state, Vermonters awoke to flooded rivers and damaged infrastructure Thursday morning. Towns and cities from Addison to Caledonia counties were hit with 3 to 5 inches of rain late Wednesday, with some totals exceeding 6 and even 7 inches, according to the National Weather Service.
“It’s kind of localized, but we had a wide swath of heavy rain and flood impacts,” Jessica Storm, a meteorologist in the weather service’s Burlington office, said Thursday morning.
According to Morrison, among the hardest-hit municipalities were Moretown, Plainfield, Lyndonville, Barre, Richmond, Bolton and Williamstown. The weather service said that Groton, Barnet and Marshfield had also suffered significant flooding. Unofficial rainfall totals showed Walden collecting more than 7 inches of rain and St. Johnsbury, Hinesburg, Monkton and Moretown taking on more than 6 inches.
As many as 7,000 customers lost power in the early hours of Thursday, according to VTOutages. By 5 p.m., roughly 500 outages remained.
As the rain mostly petered out Thursday morning, attention turned from flash flooding to overfull rivers. Officials were most focused on portions of the Winooski, Mad, Missisquoi, Passumpsic, Lamoille and Wells rivers. While many rivers had crested by 10 a.m., Morrison said, portions of the Winooski, Passumpsic and Lamoille were still rising.
“Generally, if you live near one of those rivers, just be aware,” Storm said. “Follow the local officials’ guidelines. Heed evacuations if that’s being instructed to you.”
Scattered showers were expected in parts of the state Thursday, according to Storm. “It’s not anything like yesterday,” she said. But with soils saturated and rivers full, she added, “any rainfall is not good.”
In Barre, a thin layer of mud covered some streets and sidewalks downtown, while others saw signs of hydraulic damage. Only a handful of people were out and about early Thursday assessing the scene in a city that has now been battered two years in a row on the very same day.
Hardwick experienced damage as bad as — or worse than — last summer’s flooding, officials said. The town fire station and wastewater plant flooded badly, with water just starting to recede Thursday morning. The commercial stretch of Route 15 west of downtown was also hit hard, affecting many of the same businesses that struggled to recover last year.
In Huntington, floodwaters entered homes, damaged bridges and rendered some roads impassable, according to Adam Argo, the town administrator. At least three families were staying in the town’s emergency shelter on Thursday morning, he said.
The flooding inundated parts of the Mad River Valley. In Waitsfield, a household was evacuated after the river “went through the first floor,” according to Selectboard member Fred Messer. In Fayston, according to Town Clerk Patti Lewis, a resident reported silt “up to her windowsill.”
In Montpelier, which endured significant flooding last summer, the North Branch and main stem of the Winooski River was running fast and high, but the downtown appeared to have avoided flooding.
Vermont’s four southern counties were largely spared flooding, with Rutland and Windsor counties receiving no more than an inch and a half of rain, Bennington and Windham counties recording no more than a quarter inch and the towns of Bennington and Brattleboro reporting none at all, according to the weather service.
Sarah Mearhoff, Emma Cotton, Glenn Russell, Theo Wells-Spackman, Kristen Fountain, Juan Vega de Soto and Kevin O’Connor contributed reporting.
We hope you found this article helpful. As esteemed journalist, author and VTDigger board member Jane Mayer says, “VTDigger is not just a publication. It is also a standard – one we all try to live up to. A standard for fairness, for fierceness, for honesty and for independence. Digger is creating the kind of journalism that keeps democracy alive all over the world, but most importantly right here in Vermont.”
To do this work well, VTDigger relies on the support and participation of our readers. Whether you’re making a gift once a year, like now during our Fall Member Drive or a regular monthly contribution (even better), your donation fuels our journalism.
Please join the Fall Member Drive today and help VTDigger reach our September goal of raising $75,000 to support our nonprofit news operation, and encourage your friends and neighbors to join you.
