Published: June 18, 2009 08:19 am      

Severe storms return

Whitley County faces heavy rains and funnel clouds Wednesday afternoon

By Adam Sulfridge For The Times-Tribune

Around 2:31 p.m. Wednesday afternoon, the first of many funnel-like clouds and other signs of rotation was spotted at the Williamsburg-Whitley County Airport off Hwy 25. Within minutes of the funnel cloud’s sighting, warning sirens echoed across the Williamsburg community.

Ten minutes later, that storm cell could be seen crossing the mountain, making its way southeast toward downtown Williamsburg. Shoppers at Wal-Mart (on the southwestern end of the city) stood outside the store’s main entrances, pointing into the sky toward an ominous collection of black clouds until members of management directed everyone inside and to the middle of the building.

By 3 p.m., the same system could be seen rotating overtop the Whitley County Courthouse in downtown Williamsburg. County officials, jurors, and others stood along first floor hallways in anticipation of increased activity. Fortunately, the system continued to move southeastward without incident, following the Cumberland River and disappearing into the horizon toward the Pineville area along Hwy 92 E.

An area resident reported at that time to Whitley Dispatch that a funnel cloud had touched down in the Tacket Creek area. The alleged touchdown has yet to be verified.

Rain continued to increase in severity, and around 3:45 p.m., individuals still remaining in the Whitley County Courthouse were ushered back into lower level hallways. Through windows, rotation activity could be seen above University of the Cumberlands, continuing across downtown Williamsburg until it, too, disappeared over the mountains also moving southeast.

Heavy rains around 4:20 p.m. led to reports of mud slides and dangerously high waters on multiple roadways in southern Whitley County, and state maintenance crews responded.

The onslaught of rain quickly caused more than just traffic delays, though. Shawn Jackson and other members of the Williamsburg Police Department responded to an emergency call in which three homes were described as “flooded,” and the caller could not verify whether the homes were occupied at the time. Fearing residents may be trapped in the flooding homes, Jackson crossed knee-deep, swiftly moving floodwaters to ensure nobody was trapped.

A call to Corbin’s dispatch around 6 p.m. confirmed that Corbin received no significant damage from the storms. Corbin was, however, under a flashflood warning.

Heavy rains continued in Corbin and Williamsburg, and sometime around 7 p.m., Whitley County residents were once directed to seek shelter as yet another tornado warning was issued.