Kentucky’s Red River floods Powell County

POWELL COUNTY, Ky. (WKYT) - Judge Executive Eddie Barnes tells WKYT over 20 roads are flooded in Powell County.

Marion Harrison lives on Main Street in Clay City where Red River is encroaching on his property.

“We owned this place next door [to our current home], we lost it in 2021. Then we couldn’t move back there right now until we get cleaned up and then so we moved into this [house] and now water’s threatening getting it, I’m afraid,” Harrison says.

The Red River circles behind his house as well.

Emmitt Bowen lives just across Pompeii Road off Main Street.

But Friday, he had to travel 25 minutes around to get to his relative’s pet grooming shop.

“I mean it’s getting pretty bad. It’s worse than last time, for sure. Because it didn’t make it in last time, but it’s already almost in. We’ve got another foot and it’s in the shop,” Bowen says.

For Cody Trent, his mom lives just down the road next to Pompeii Road. He wasn’t able to get to her Friday.

He came over to the area to look at the flood waters.

“It’s bad,” Trent says.

“Have you ever seen it this bad before?,” I asked him.

“Once.”

“What was that like?”

“Worse than this that’s for sure,” Trent says.

Over at Kentucky Reptile Zoo in Powell County, owner Kristen Wiley is stranded.

WKYT was able to interview her across her flooded driveway.

“We spent the late afternoon getting…all of our animals that might be low, like, up into a safe place. So, there’s nothing that could potentially be exposed at this point,” Wiley says.

She tells us around 30-50 reptiles had to be moved.

Including venomous snakes, alligators, and turtles.

With the zoo closed during Spring Break, Wiley says, “At the very least, several thousand dollars that we would have expected to have come through this weekend probably will not happen.”

Covered roadways are preventing delivery drivers from making it to their next stop.

For Fed Ex Driver Billy Neal, his next stop was Menifee County.

“Honestly, I don’t even know if I can get into Menifee County from [Powell County] to get most of my packages delivered [Friday],” Neal says.

He tells us he’s been unable to deliver over 20 packages.

“I’ve got people medicine [to deliver] that can’t be delivered right now. And that’s pretty bad on them, you know. I know some of it could be critical medicine, some of it may not be, but it still shouldn’t matter, it’s still medicine,” Neal says.

Despite water blocking roadways, he says he has a plan.

“Go to as many places as I can, I mean, [I’ve got to] deliver the rest of it when I can,” Neal says.