NEW RIVER VALLEY, Va. – Joe and Melinda Ogle built their Giles County home on Willowcroft Lane 26 years ago.
After heavy rain hit the region, the family heard a thump on Thursday and discovered the hillside above their home had shifted, knocking over a retaining wall and sending it straight into their garage. A soil expert from Virginia Tech evaluated the damage over the weekend and told the Ogles that their home is uninhabitable.
“This is my life right there. I don’t even know what to say," said Joe Ogle. "We built this home and now it’s gone. Gone in a day.”
The next morning they noticed a deep crack in a retaining wall beneath Winding Way Drive, which sits atop the hillside above their home.
A Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) spokesperson said it built the retaining wall last year to stabilize the route. Saturday, a VDOT geologist inspected the road and said he believes the crack is cosmetic. VDOT monitored the conditions every day over the weekend. Monday evening, the spokesperson told 10 News that VDOT plans to close Winding Way Road.
In Christiansburg, flash flooding on College Street left a neighborhood underwater. Steven Purcell barely had enough time to move his valuables up out of reach and move both his and his girlfriend’s cars before the floodwaters filled their garage and rose within inches of their living room.
“By then my garage was filled with two to three feet of water," Purcell said.
On that same street, a Montgomery County Sheriff’s Deputy’s personal dog drowned when their basement wall collapsed and flooded.
“I got two dogs myself. It was hard not to cry at that moment,” said Purcell. "It was just hard to hear.”
For those families, the flash flooding and rain wreaked havoc on their homes, leaving some with nowhere to go.
“We’ve got to go somewhere and I don’t know where right now. But we’re just praying for support because we need it," said Ogle.
Ogle said the soil expert informed him the property can be fixed, but the costs are too much for the Ogle family to afford. So on Monday, the Ogle family began moving all their belongings out of their house to store in a trailer. The couple is currently staying with Melinda’s parents next door, but said they need to look for somewhere else to live.
Neighbors in Christiansburg said they were furious about the damage because the sewer and stormwater drainage issues have been ongoing.
A Christiansburg spokesperson told 10 News:
“The Town of Christiansburg is aware that some areas of our community experienced a significant amount of rainfall in a short period of time yesterday and that has resulted in property damage for some of our residents. The Town has been committed to improving stormwater infrastructure for many years; for example, last year, we spent more than $2 million on stormwater operations and capital projects. However, the extraordinary amount of rain this week has caused flooding in most communities across southwest Virginia.”