On Wednesday, members of Kevin Gudgel’s leadership class at Burlington-Edison High School traveled to Gudgel’s hometown of Chehalis to present a check and gift cards for $3,500 to help W.F. West High School students recover from flooding that ravaged the region earlier this month.

By KATE MARTIN

Skagit Valley Herald staff writer

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CHEHALIS — Rain fell in fat drops as seven students from Burlington-Edison High School filed out of a white school district van.

The students from Kevin Gudgel’s leadership class walked toward the entrance of W.F. West High School, hopping curbs and dodging deep puddles with playful laughs.

Later in the day, the students would tour the soggy countryside around Chehalis. They got an eyeful.

“I thought it was really heartbreaking seeing people going through the stuff in their yard. You’d see piles of mud where they tried to scrape the mud off their yards,” student Katie Griffith said. “People were trying to piece things together, slowly but surely.”

A month ago, the two schools’ football teams met in a first-round game of the Class 2A state playoffs; the B-E Tigers prevailed, routing the visiting Bearcats 40-15. Three weeks later, Lewis County, where W.F. West is located, was under water, staggered by torrential rain and massive flooding.

Gudgel’s students decided to help after viewing videos of Chehalis, Gudgel’s hometown, on the Internet. His class spent more than a week collecting donations from students and from town residents at the Mount Vernon Safeway. The original goal was about $1,200, but donations kept pouring in. One anonymous couple donated $500, Gudgel said, because they thought the money would more easily flow to the student flood victims.

On Wednesday, Gudgel’s class traveled 3 1 /2 hours to present a check and gift cards for $3,500 to help W.F. West students recover.

W.F. West Vice Principal Tim Touhey said the flood closed the school for three days. The homes of some 60 students were directly affected by the flood.

Two weeks later, he said he still hasn’t seen some of those students. They have scattered all over, living with other family members and friends. One teen relocated to Puyallup, more than an hour’s drive from W.F. West. Touhey fears he will drop out before the year ends.

“There are some (students) we will probably never see again,” he said. “And that’s just in this school.”

Floodwaters up to 10 feet deep closed Interstate 5 for nearly a week in the area. The high school, on high ground, turned into a makeshift shelter as National Guard troops in helicopters rescued residents from rooftops.

The Burlington group visited Kevin Ryan’s advanced current issues class at W.F. West, where they heard from a student, Sarah, who had lost everything. Sarah lives near Boistfort, the area that was most affected by the flood. She and her family were trapped in their home by 7 a.m. Dec. 3 and later rescued by a helicopter.

But while only one student in Ryan’s class was affected, dozens raised their hands when he asked who had volunteered to help.

“Most of our student body did find ways to help,” Ryan said. “Richard has been shoveling mud for the most part.”

On a tour of the town, the students saw that Burlington and Chehalis are not so different. The towns, on opposite ends of Interstate 5, host strip malls, chain restaurants and big box stores. Both towns are surrounded by land that has been farmed for generations by the same families. And both towns depend on a levee system to protect them from high water.

W.F. West student body Vice President Zach Sayler, also a lineman on the football team, said he was impressed by Burlington during November’s game.

“You guys have a huge fan section, great band, great atmosphere, awesome stadium. Win or lose, it was a great experience,” Sayler said.

He said he knew people from across the United States would rally behind the flood victims, but he was touched that Gudgel’s students drove down to present the gift in person.

“I’m really happy that these guys are here,” he said. “It’s a really nice thing, especially that you guys raised so much money.”

Burlington student Maddy Barden apologized to Sayler for the Tigers’ drubbing of the Bearcats last month. Her classmates shushed her, but Sayler laughed.

“It’s a nice gesture,” he said, “but our quarterback got a concussion on the first play of the game and didn’t come back until the second half. If he’d played the whole game, it would’ve been a different story.”

After visiting the school for about half an hour, the Burlington students piled back into the van. Gudgel, who attended W.F. West, took students on a backroads tour of Boistfort Valley. Gudgel’s class did not intrude on recovery efforts. He said he wanted to be sensitive to residents, but they did stop occasionally to look.

A thick slurry of mud caked most of the fields near Boistfort. Farm equipment lay abandoned and half-buried while dead corn stalks poked through the vast expanse of mud.

It didn’t take long for Gudgel’s students to realize it could have just as easily been them.
Burlington student Cole Whited said he remembers when the town prepared for a flood on the Skagit River.

“When we were sandbagging, we were nervous, we were scared,” he said. “But it was nothing like this.”

Gudgel stopped near the area where an immense logjam backed up behind a bridge. Though the students were more than a mile from the logs, they could easily see them stacked several stories high and across a dozen or so acres. Cranes plucked away at the pile to load them onto trucks.

Gudgel said it could take years for the area to recover. He worked in those fields as a teen.

“It’s worse than I thought,” Gudgel said. “I thought two weeks later you wouldn’t see the devastation as much. … It really is like a Hurricane Katrina or a Mount St. Helens disaster.”

Few cars traversed the back roads. Instead, students saw dozens of dump trucks full of debris. Many residents had shoved their belongings into a muddy, soggy pile in the front yard. Students saw dishes, lumber and mattresses stuck in trees several feet above the ground.

After they toured the area, the students picked up some food and ate at Gudgel’s parents’ house, which was spared from the flood by mere feet. Water crept up the front yard, but stopped near the front steps.

“This community is sad,” said Durelle Sullivan, Gudgel’s mother. “Everyone’s rallying around each other. But Christmas trees, the lights, shopping, everything. It’s all very muted.”

Originally published Dec. 22, 2007.