Chief, Margaretville Fire Department, Middletown, Delaware County
On August 28, 2012, Rosa coordinated a vast effort to rescue villagers from the rising waters. Many of those trapped needed to be rescued by water in small boats, including a rowboat. One man Rosa helped rescue had to make a tough decision: Do you rescue the family pig?
Rosa recalls:
I basically went without sleep. It covered the gamut from actually physically jumping in the water to help rescue people to organizing and managing the rescue effort. The people on Main Street -- I was one of the ones in the boat rescuing the people on Main Street. We took a three-year-old out by boat. When things got crazy, it was all hands on deck. That's what we did. We had to worry about all the people in the town of Hardenburgh who were cut off -- we organized welfare checks on them. I was in the firehouse for about 12 days straight.
I had gotten up early that morning. I had set my alarm clock to get up early because of the weather forecast. I was only up for five minutes when I got a phone call from one of the past chiefs of the fire department that lives way up in the town of Hardenburgh, telling me that there was three feet of water going over the road there. That was six o'clock in the morning.
So I went out the door and headed in that direction, and I could only go up the road a couple of miles. Lo and behold, it was all flooded. So at the point, I headed back to Margaretville and started the process of getting my people prepared for the worst.
Where did you get all these boats?
We ended up putting our [fire department] boat, which was just a rowboat, into service on Main Street. I knew then the flood was coming, so I made sure that we had fire trucks over at the hospital on [the other] side of the river, and we made sure we got an ambulance on our side of the river. And then, when it started on flooding Main Street and we knew we had people left that we had to try to get out, that's when we started using our ladder truck and our rowboat. The county had already called for a boat from Sidney, so they came in from that [opposite] side [of the river] and actually brought their boat across to us. That was at ten in the morning.
One woman died in Fleischmanns, the village next to Margaretville. Were you worried that people in your jurisdiction might die?
When I finally heard that they had had somebody killed in Fleischmanns, I was not surprised at all. I was very worried that we were going to have a loss of life. I think [the fact that no one died in Margaretville] was part being lucky and part just getting the job done, as far the first responders went.
There's a story in Margaretville about rescuers trying to help a man and his pig. Tell me more about that.
I was on the boat when we went up to get Butch Wiliams, and he had to leave his pig. When we got there with the boat, Butch and his wife and his mother-in-in-law were there, and he was in the house with their dog and his pig.
There was nothing special about the pig. He was raising the pig probably for pork. But it was out back when it started flooding, and he ended up bringing the pig inside. When I got there, the water was about three-and-a-half feet deep instead the house. We were all wading around in it. The pig was able to stand and hold its snout up above the water, and that was about it.
It took two trips. First, we loaded Butch's wife and his mother-in-law in the boat and took them back and dropped them off, and I stayed there with Butch. I said, “You can take the dog, but they're not going to let you take the pig.” It was too heavy to pick up and put in the boat anyway.
But I told him, “Don't worry about it. The pig will probably be floating around on furniture and he'll probably be waiting for you tomorrow.” And sure enough, he was. The pig survived. It had a happy ending.
How do you feel about the flood one year later?
Well, you know, I have kind of totally forgotten about everything, which is kind of nice. And then you start seeing the articles come out talking about the one-year thing, and then you think back on it a little bit.
Is it hard?
I'm not sure if it's hard, or if I'm relieved that I'm not doing it this year.
Text by Julia Reischel. Photo of Gene Rosa and other Margaretville volunteer firefighters at the fire hall in Margaretville by Christopher Auger-Dominguez.