Residents of the Chehalis Avenue Apartments remove belongings from a unit on Monday night in Chehalis.
A young woman walks along the berm surrounding the Chehalis Avenue Apartments on Monday night as residents of the complex evacuate their apartments.
Residents of the Chehalis Avenue Apartments look at a wall of sandbags that was built to help keep water out of the apartment complex on Monday night in Chehalis.
Heather Luurs loads a bike onto the back of a truck as she evacuates her apartment building on Monday night at the Chehalis Avenue Apartments.
David Williams' dog sits in the front seat of his truck while he helps his daughter, Devinnie Williams, evacuate her apartment at the Chehalis Avenue Apartments on Monday night.
Several residents at a Chehalis apartment complex evacuated their homes Monday evening.
Managers of the Chehalis Avenue Apartments about a quarter-mile south of the Lewis County Courthouse urged residents of the lower floors of the two-story, 60-unit apartment complex to evacuate just after 6 p.m. and take what valuables they could.
After hearing from a resident in the complex that a levee, dike or berm near Darigold in Chehalis broke, manager Michelle Abrego tried to verify the rumor with non-emergency line operators. She said the dispatcher told her no one else had called reporting that. Shortly after that, she received a call from the Chehalis Police Department and was told the levee had broke, she said.
An officer was on scene shortly to discuss the situation, she said.
Bottom floor residents — half of the 60 families that live in the complex — were required to leave, she said.
However, some weren’t planning to.
Nick Bussing, 28, lives in the bottom floor of one of the apartment buildings. He and his friend, who lives in a different building on the bottom floor, said they weren’t evacuating. They said they’re used to flooding having lived in the area for many years.
“It’s not scary,” Bussing said, but added later that he was monitoring the weather on his phone all day at work. He also said he was going to get his TV out of his unit and to higher ground.
Other residents took immediate action.
Trevor Dahlberg said he has lived at the apartment complex with his girlfriend Devinnie Wililams and their two children for three years. The family received help from Devinnie’s father, David Williams, of Chehalis, who brought his truck over to help them carry out valuable items such as collectibles, beds and toys.
“Had a couple close calls, but this is the worst yet,” Dahlberg said regarding previous flood threats. “The kids think it’s awesome. They want their bedrooms to be a swimming pool, but I told them no.”
As of 8:45 p.m., it was still unclear whether or not a levee, berm or dike had actually broken. Floodwaters lapped against a berm protecting the southern portion of the apartment complex along Chehalis Avenue, but no water had entered into any apartments.
A Chronicle reporter contacted Lewis County Central Dispatch, where a dispatcher reported emergency officials were searching for a breach after numerous reports, but could not find one.
Still, several people at the Chehalis Avenue Apartments decided to not take chances.
Abrego, who began managing the complex in September, said there was no deadline for when people needed to evacuate, but she said she would be checking to make sure all those required to leave did.
“We just have to make sure everybody’s safe,” she said.
The upper level residents had a choice of whether they wanted to stay or go.
Many residents who lived on the second floor decided to wait out the flooding, and in turn gave a hand to their neighbors below. Teresa Steffens was one such person, helping neighbors pack bags into cars while telling them she would be just fine where she was.
“I’ve lived here since 1994, so I’ve seen at least four floods,” Steffens said.
She also said she was staying partly out of necessity.
“There’s nowhere to go. There’s no shelter for us,” Steffens said. “And I don’t want to leave my animals.”
Abrego’s family, who lives in a two-level townhouse in the complex, moved their electronics upstairs and plan on staying there as long as possible.
But her 10-year-old daughter is pretty “freaked out,” she said, and she has secured a free hotel room, if needed.
Sandbagging efforts began at about 10 p.m. Sunday at a parking lot entrance for one of the apartment buildings on Chehalis Avenue, but Monday evening, Abrego said a truck drove by and the sandbag wall was knocked over and water “gushed” into the parking lot.
Abrego, her husband, a housekeeper and some residents rushed out to rebuilding the sandbag wall, which was still holding at 8 p.m.
“It’s not the best job, but we had to do what we could do,” she said.
Twenty-five-year-old Angus Young, who has lived in the complex for three years, said if the sandbag wall had been built better, he doesn’t think people would have to evacuate.
He was working so he was unable to help build the wall, which he said should have been as high and as wide as the dike along the road.
The residents who built the wall did the best they could, he said, but it just wasn’t done right.
Some renters took extra precautions and sandbagged their doors.
Darrell Pinkerton was on site helping his son-in-law sandbag his doors. The family of five will be staying with him in Winlock for the night.
He said he didn’t know if the sandbags would help, but it’s better to try.
