Farmington Volunteer Fire Department facing hardships due to recent flooding

FARMINGTON, W.Va. (WBOY) — Despite being nearly a week later, the Farmington Volunteer Fire Department’s (VFD’s) substation, alongside residents in rural Marion County is still dealing with complications due to last week’s flooding .

The Farmington Volunteer Fire Department’s substation located off Plum Run Road has undergone two floods since reopening last year, creating difficult and dangerous work conditions for its staff.

Flooding has not only infiltrated the substation, but has also covered Plum Run Road and Fairgrounds Road, which sit adjacent to the fire department, making travel for rescue missions more difficult given that the substation serves 125 homes.

“We have a house a quarter mile away from our fire station here. If this road was accessible, the house could be serviced in two minutes from the time we get here. We have to go three miles out of our way just to get to the house that is a quarter mile,” Farmington VFD Captain Andrew Schwartz said.

Both Fairgrounds Road and Plum Run take a toll whenever it rains, regardless of how much water falls, and a lack of service to the area by the West Virginia Division of Highways (DOH) has made problems worse.

Plum Run is a curvy, narrow road that can barely fit two vehicles on it at the same time, and its ditches and culverts are filled with debris which has caused the road itself to deteriorate.

Although Farmington’s Volunteer Fire Department has reached out to the DOH multiple times, the only action substation staff said has taken place was the addition of gravel at the end of Fairgrounds Road, which has since washed away.

Damage from the floods has not only drained the entirety of the fire department’s levy-granted budget due to needed repairs but also each fireman’s patience, as all of them are volunteers.

“If the fire department keeps getting flooded, we’re going to have to reevaluate what we’re going to do, because we cannot keep dumping money into a station that keeps getting damaged by the flood waters,” said Schwartz.

The last time Schwartz heard from the DOH, it told him that the department and a few neighboring residents were responsible for replacing culverts before the DOH could do anything.

12 News reached out to the DOH for a statement on the matter and received the following response:

The flood issue is caused by an undersized pipe under the fire department’s driveway. The road, CO 18/4, is WVDOH maintained up to the end of the fire department’s driveway under the WVDOH core plan and according to records at the district and county level. WVDOH is working with the volunteer fire department to solve the issue.

West Virginia Division of Highways

12 News will continue to follow this story as it develops.

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