Residents in the southern area of Florence County and some Florence subdivisions were still dealing with flooding Monday from Tropical Storm Gaston.

Several homes and roads in the Lynches Lake Camp Branch Watershed area, which stretches about 20 miles from U.S. 301 near Olanta to Jordan Road near Lake City, were covered with water Monday after Gaston poured about nine inches of rain on the area Sunday. The flooding did not cause any injuries or force any evacuations.

“With no more rain, the water’s going to run off pretty quickly and the situation should ease up pretty fast. But if more rain comes before then, we could be in a real bad situation,” said John Earl Lee, chairman of the watershed, which is a geographic area into which surrounding waters, sediments and dissolved materials drain and whose boundaries extend along surrounding topographic ridges.

Often, Lee said, flooding in the Lynches Lake Camp Branch Watershed area is caused by the conditions of a ditch that runs through the entire area.

“The ditch needs cleaning out from one end to the other, and that’s going to be a very expensive job,” Lee said. “And we get so little funding, we don’t have the kind of money it would take to do it.”

Even some neighborhoods in the city of Florence, including the Huntington subdivision off Second Loop Road, experienced heavy flooding. On Sydney Avenue, many residents were forced to find alternative means of transportation Monday because their yards, driveways and vehicles were still under water.

Black Creek should reach flood stage this week Residents of the Black Creek area should keep a close eye on the creek this week and prepare for evacuation as water levels are expected to rise to the flooding point by Thursday, leaving homes isolated and roads out of the area unfit for travel. As of 5:30 p.m. Monday, Black Creek’s banks were full with a water level of 9.89 feet, up almost eight feet from its level 24 hours earlier, Florence County Emergency Preparedness Manager Dusty Owens said. “Like we’ve always said, Black Creek is a different animal,” Owens said. “It rises very fast and can shoot up to flood level in a matter of hours.” Owens said according to a forecast by the National Weather Service’s River Forecast Office, the river is expected to crest at 10 to 11 feet by Thursday. “That’s with the amount of rain we’ve gotten up to this point,” Owens said. “Any future rainfall could make the situation worse.” If the creek crests at that level as expected, Sandpit Road will be crossed by water, leaving about three homes along that road isolated. About 20 homes along East Black Creek Road also could be affected and/or isolated by flooding. “The citizens of those areas should be monitoring the water levels very closely and should go ahead and make plans to evacuate so they’re not isolated when the road gets cut by rising waters,” Owens said. “If the water continues to rise as we expect it will, we will be encouraging residents to leave before they get stranded.” Residents are encouraged to begin making plans to stay with family members or friends in the event of an evacuation.

Gaston hit the South Carolina coast with maximum sustained winds of 70 mph, but the storm had weakened substantially by the time it moved across the Pee Dee. Throughout most of the Pee Dee, the storm’s wrath came in the form of gusty winds and torrential downpours, causing power outages in many areas.

Pee Dee Electric Cooperative spokeswoman Wanda Smallwood said Pee Dee Electric customers experienced very few outages on Sunday. However, strong winds in the evening and into the night resulted in 1,900 outages throughout the Pee Dee Electric coverage area.

In Marion County, 790 customers lost power when a tall tree toppled Sunday evening, bringing down six spans of line. At 2 a.m. Monday, a 60-foot tree outside of Darlington near Black Creek uprooted and its top landed over power lines causing 600 outages. Another large tree in Timmonsville toppled, causing 300 outages. The remaining 210 outages were scattered throughout the area and affected few meters at a time. All power was restored by 7 a.m. Monday, Smallwood said.

“Our right-of-way program is paying off,” Pee Dee Electric President and CEO Robert W. Williams said. “Many more member-owners would have lost power if we didn’t maintain rights-of-way.”

About 6,000 Progress Energy customers experienced outages as the storm moved across the Pee Dee, Progress Energy spokeswoman Mindy Taylor said. Most of those outages were in Williamsburg, Florence, Darlington and Clarendon counties. Fortunately, Taylor said, Progress Energy crews were already on standby to deal with such occurrences.

“Our crews were out and ready to go,” she said. “So nobody was out of power for very long.”

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