Bonnie Combs stands by and watches her property become covered by the North Fork of the Kentucky River in Jackson, Ky., Thursday, July 28, 2022. Flash flooding and mudslides were reported across the mountainous region of eastern Kentucky, where thunderstorms have dumped several inches of rain over the past few days.
Gov. Andy Beshear told The Associated Press before touring the disaster area Friday that the 15 dead in Kentucky includes children, “but I expect that number to more than double, probably even throughout today.” Emergency crews made close to 50 air rescues and hundreds of water rescues on Thursday, and more people still needed help, the governor said. “This is not only an ongoing disaster but an ongoing search and rescue. The water is not going to crest in some areas until tomorrow.”
“There are hundreds of families that have lost everything,” Beshear said. “And many of these families didn’t have much to begin with. And so it hurts even more. But we’re going to be there for them.”reported more than 33,000 customers remained without electricity Friday in eastern Kentucky, West Virginia and Virginia, with the bulk of the outages in Kentucky.