News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
The Cookeville Fire Department, Cookeville Police and Putnam County Rescue Squad are joining forces to send a Swiftwater Rescue Team and a Drone team to East Tennessee due to flooding.
Cookeville Fire Chief Benton Young said the teams were asked to be deployed after intense rainfall combined with the failure intensified the flooding in the area near Johnson City Tennessee. Young said the area is now under a state of emergency.
“Those areas have assets and emergency services assets too but they have lost some of their emergency assets because of the flooding,” Young said. “And they can’t get to other places or cut off from certain areas so we will try to help them any way we can as far as getting to build that their help.”
Young said the teams will help rescue people who are trapped. Young said the departments left early in the afternoon and are expected to arrive in the area later tonight and will be spending around 24 – 36 hours helping out.
“Each of those has a specialized team in swift water,” Young said. “Our swift water teams are able to do swift-water rescues and reach people by boats in these types of situations.”
Young said the fire department was requested to respond by the Tennessee Mutual Aid agreement. Young said the main objective is to save as many people as possible.
