EDITOR'S NOTE:
The following was featured in The State
newspaper on Saturday, Sept. 20, 2014.
Stats: Eyewall passed over Clarendon County with winds still at hurricane strength more than 80 miles inland; One report noted 87 percent of trees were knocked over or snapped; 84 percent of structures damaged; parts of the county went more than a month without electricity.
Jim Darby, then-director of the regional council of governments, said local leaders gathered for a briefing as Hugo neared the coast. “The general attitude was it wasn’t going to be as bad we thought it could be,” he recalled 25 years later.
He began hearing trees fall around his home on Lake Marion near Summerton around 11 p.m. Three hours later, the eye passing gave a chance to see some of the damage. Then the back side of the storm pounded the area for four more hours.
Between Darby’s house and his brother-in-law’s house nearby, he counted 38 huge trees across the road. Power was out everywhere. Fish were floundering in his azalea bushes.
Darby’s family didn’t have power or running water for 28 days at their home. They pulled buckets of water from the lake to flush their toilets. “We greeted the power company workers like they were the soldiers going into Paris at the end of WWII,” Darby said.
Darby believes the region is better equipped to handle another Hugo. Emergency managers have better tools, from vehicles to radios. People older than about 35 have vivid memories of what Hugo was like.
“Most everybody has a chain saw now,” Darby said. “If they see a storm coming, they’ll have gas in their four-wheelers and their generators.”
