Residents are now cleaning up from the massive flooding caused by an intense storm that swept through State College Thursday evening.
Described by AccuWeather senior meteorologist Mike Piggot as “one of the largest non-tropical storms in 20 years,” many resident downtown saw their homes flooded and property damaged.
The University Club on West College Avenue was one such property that had problems with flooding. General manager Cori Agostinelli described a team effort to help keep water out of the basement of the social club and graduate housing complex.
“We ended up with about an inch of water in the basement,” Agostinelli said. “We all kind of pulled together ankle deep in water trying to stem the flow.”
The U-Club is located on the campus side of College Ave. but is technically not a part of University Park. The 105-year-old building sits at the bottom of the valley, making it prone to runoff water and flooding.
“It took us about an hour or so to cleanup. It’s a hundred year old building so I’m certain that it has been through an awful lot,” Agostinelli said. “We didn’t float away. It’s terrifying when that happens.”
In another part of town near the Walmart on North Atherton Street, Kory Boothe was setting up a tent to sell fireworks for July 4th celebrations. He said the flood water caused a lot of damage in a matter of minutes.
“I spent probably 12 hours setting up everything,” Boothe said. “There was probably $20,000 worth of fireworks in the tent. All the tables flipped over except six of them. We probably lost 60 percent of what we had.”
Although Boothe was able to order more fireworks, he said it certainly took a significant chunk out of his sales this week.
“When the water started coming in everything started moving around,” Boothe said. “Within seconds all the product was ruined.”
