Ball Park Road Restored In Record Time
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| Eagle Rock, VA (Aug. 4, 025) - On Thursday, July 31st, the Botetourt Emergency Communication Center notified both Eagle Rock Volunteer Fire Department and Emergency Management officials of a situation in the 2000 block of Ball Park Road, where a large rainstorm had moved through the area and washed out a significant section of the roadway. Initial personnel to respond identified that an approximately 25 foot span of the roadway was gone, and that just over 30 homes were cut off. Once this was determined, Virginia Department of Emergency Management was contacted and made aware of the situation. A door-to-door evaluation was conducted and occupants were offered the opportunity to leave and be transported to other accommodations for the evening. A total of 14 homes were occupied and no one elected to be relocated that night.
On Friday morning, Emergency Management personnel were once again onsite, this time with a Virginia Department of Emergency Management official. Overnight, Governor Glenn Youngkin reached out directly to local officials to offer the state’s assistance. In coordination with the state, Virginia Department of Transportation was able to allow for an engineer from the Salem office to come evaluate the situation. Given that this segment of the road is privately owned, identifying how it was to be fixed, was going to be the most significant challenge.
Through phone calls with local officials, given the rainy conditions on Friday, a call was made to see if a business in the area would have any capacity to help. That call proved to be the answer to restore vital transportation to those on the other side of the outage.
APEX Energy CEO Ken Young immediately offered their assistance with whatever was needed to help. Within an hour, a crew of almost a dozen, from APEX and Faulconer Construction were on site evaluating the situation. A few minutes later, a plan was in place.
Later that day, the Virginia Department of Forestry was also able to assist, exercising local bulldozer assets to take a narrow side-by-side trail and widen spots that otherwise would not have allowed for a pickup truck to pass. Completing this mission, helped emergency crews have a backup plan for access, as not only was this segment of the community cut off from the ability to travel in and out of the area, but local fire, EMS, and law enforcement would not have been able to reach them in any timely manner would there have been an emergency. This increased the significance of the need for a quick turnaround and resolve to the situation.
On Saturday, August 2nd , personnel from APEX and Faulconer, along with their heavy equipment, were on site and the roadway was restored by sundown. The efforts of this group were simply amazing. If it had not been for their immediate willingness to take on this project, the costs and timeline of the outage would have been significantly larger.
Many thanks go out to the APEX and Faulconer team, as well as Virginia Departments of Forestry, Transport, and Emergency Management, as well as the Governor’s Office and the Secretariat of Homeland Security and Public Safety. This was a team effort to ensure that the situation was resolved in a timely manner. | |
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