Officials assess flood damage
President Trump signs emergency declaration for Michigan
MIDLAND, Mich. — Many Central Michigan residents remained cut off from their homes Thursday even as floodwaters receded, with senior citizens among the scores of displaced people staying in shelters after flooding overwhelmed two dams, submerged homes and washed out roads.
President Donald Trump, who was in Michigan to visit a Ford production plant, signed an emergency declaration authorizing the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief efforts.
At Midland High School, 90 percent of people who slept in the school’s gym were senior citizens, said shelter coordinator Jerry Wasserman.
He said extra precautions were in place due to the combination of the guests’ ages and the coronavirus pandemic.
“We had to deal with COVID and then deal with their angst of what’s happened to their house and their pets and all this” Wasserman said Thursday.
In Midland, 61 people spent Wednesday night and Thursday morning in temporary shelters, according to city spokeswoman Selina Tisdale. That number — mostly the elderly and families — dwindled throughout Thursday as floodwaters receded and some residents were able to return home, she said.
It could be days before the full scope of damage can be assessed, officials said. No flood-related deaths or injuries have been reported.
The flooding forced about 11,000 people to evacuate their homes in the Midland area, about 140 miles north of Detroit, following what the National Weather Service called “catastrophic dam failures” at the Edenville Dam, about 20 miles northwest of Midland, and the Sanford Dam, about 9 miles northwest of the city.
Other area residents returned to their homes to find heavy damage. And around Wixom Lake in Midland County’s Hope Township, which lost most of its water when the Edenville Dam failed, residents wondered Thursday when, or if, it will be refilled.
The National Weather Service said communities farther downstream should brace for flooding in the coming days. A flood warning was in effect Thursday along the Tittabawassee River from Midland downstream into Saginaw, and flooding in that area was possible through the weekend.