Governor Healey tours flood damage in western Massachusetts
WILLIAMSBURG - Governor Maura Healey toured storm damage and flooding in western Massachusetts Wednesday and vowed to help the region recover.
Healey got a close up look at flooded fields and farms in Williamsburg during her first stop before heading to North Adams.
The governor offered state help as her administration begins to asses the damage but didn't have specifics yet. Healey said she's talking to the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) about what needs to happen in terms of assistance.
"I am so sorry for the problems, the pain, the people are experiencing. Some have experienced real, true devastation in terms of loss of crops, loss of livelihood, potential loss of jobs," Healey told reporters in Williamsburg. "We're going to have to rebuild and recover."
The governor also said Massachusetts is ready to help neighboring Vermont, which was hit by catastrophic flooding.
"We find ourselves in a somewhat different situation, fortunately, though we also recognize that for some here, people are really hurt, really, really hurt and we want to make sure that we're doing all we can for those folks," Healey said.
Water from Vermont has run all the way down to western Massachusetts. The swollen Connecticut River gushed onto Route 5 in Northampton eventually shutting down that road.
In South Hadley, boat docks were tossed over, mangled with debris, and crushed into piles of wood.
"I boated on the river for years and I feel bad for the boaters because it's going to take a long time as you can see to even be able to clean this," boater Kim Schleicher told WBZ-TV.
Upstream in Hadley, front yards turned into ponds.
After living on the river for 34 years, it's not Michael Damon's first rodeo with flooding on his property, but it's the worst he's experienced since Hurricane Irene in 2011 when he was forced to lift his house.
"It's the first time it's happened since Irene," said Damon.
Roads to campsites along the Connecticut River were flooded out too. One group took kayaks out to see what was left of their campsite and they found it six feet under water.
"We were lucky we paid attention to the news and saw that it was going to crest pretty high, we left Sunday," said one of the kayakers.
"I've never seen this, and I've lived here my whole life," said Lisa Marrero in Northampton. "I didn't think it would come all the way down here so that's crazy."
Whether its obliterated docks, or concerns about flooded crops, they're bracing for a long cleanup process.
"It could happen in the next year, or the year after or the year after and the year after, who knows, you have to be ready for it," said Damon.
