Skiatook Residents Become Flood Victims After Overnight Storms

Severe storms and torrential rain brought flooding to parts of Green Country overnight Sunday.

The noisy storms knocked down power lines and broke tree branches.

Thousands of people didn't have power this morning. In Tulsa County alone, Public Service Company of Oklahoma reported 5,000 customers without electricity after 65-mph winds hit the area.

The rain, however, is what Oklahoma needed, but some areas got too much.

Water, water everywhere.

"It was about waist-deep from where I am standing right now," John Phillips said.

A river where there shouldn't be. Flood waters swirled around these homes on South Locust Street in Skiatook early Monday morning.

Everyone was sleeping, or at least trying to, when the thunder and lightning cracked.

They all say they heard the same strange noise.

"We could hear it going through the vents inside," Amber Almy said. "Like gurgling. Sounds like a river almost in there."

"I heard the water bubbling in the duct work," Phillips said.

"We actually heard gurgling" Micki DeYoung said. "That's what woke me up. It was the gurgling of pipes and bubbles were coming up out of the ground. And so I stepped out into 6 inches of water on my floor.

Skiatook Fire Chief Dale Parrish says the drainage ditch near the neighborhood overflowed by 4 to 5 feet.

"The water was actually up high enough that it pushed the car up over the way it is right now," Phillips said.

Fire crews rescued five people and two dogs.

"A boat! First time we've taken a boat out of our house," Almy said.

The water finally receded but the damage was done.

"It was unexpected," Phillips said. "We moved from one end of town to the other to get away from the flood waters and here we are.

Cars, appliances and odds and ends were destroyed. And now they start the effort to salvage whatever they can.

"I'm sick this morning," Almy said. "It's like where do you even start to clean it up? I mean, it's just a mess. I don't even know how to clean it.

Claremore was also drenched with rain.

The Red Cross is helping six families after a foot and half of water got into their apartments.