Photo by Emma Delk Elm Terrace Shopping Center business owners began cleaning carpets and scrubbing floors following flash flooding in the area on Thursday night.

WHEELING — Businesses and homeowners in Bethlehem, Elm Grove and Triadelphia began cleaning out flooded basements and yards early Friday following another round of flash flooding.

Parts of Ohio County received almost 3 inches of rain in under an hour on Thursday night. The torrential rainfall clogged storm drains in the city, resulting in water accumulation in certain areas and on roadways.

The Elm Terrace Shopping Center’s parking lot and businesses were one of the areas hit hardest on Thursday night. Business owners in the area worked into the early hours of Friday morning to remove water from their stores. A thick layer of mud still covered the parking lot on Friday morning.

MiMi’s Hallmark & Gifts Owner Debbie Smith said her store received 4-5 inches of water Thursday night. Her husband and son-in-law worked to unclog the drain in the parking lot that night, beginning the process of removing water from the area.

Smith said the Sherrard Volunteer Fire Department and MMC Land Management would be coming to the parking lot on Friday to help clear out the mud.

Smith had to remove cash registers and other merchandise from her store following the flooding. She had already stopped by St. Mark’s Lutheran Church Friday morning to pick up cleaning supplies to begin scrubbing down items in her store touched by the floodwater.

“All I can say is we’re thankful,” Smith said. “You can’t ask for better people. Everybody’s stopping by and offering to help bring supplies.”

Further down Elm Grove Terrace, 10-42 Tactical received several inches of standing water on Thursday night. Owner Bryan Gaus said Dream Clean Carpet & Furniture Care “worked wonders” to clean up the store. Gaus was still cleaning mud on the store’s floor with the help of employees on Friday morning.

“We lost a lot of product and merchandise, but it could have been worse,” Gaus said. “Comparatively speaking, to everything that happened in Valley Grove and Triadelphia, we count our blessings that this all happened because it could have been a lot worse. It’s just stuff that we lost, and it can be replaced.”

In addition to losing inventory, the store also lost toy donations they had intended to give to victims of the flash flooding on Saturday, June 14.

“We had a toy drive that a lot of it got ruined that we were actually going to take today and donate,” Gaus said. “But, we’ll be back up and running that drive again. It could have been a lot worse, so we’ll be fine.”

National Equipment Co. President Jade Waligura had to sweep out an inch of water from their Elm Terrace Shopping Center building, which they use for excess storage, on Friday morning. The company’s new building at the corner of the parking lot, which was set to be inspected that morning, also had mud and debris wash over it from the flash flooding.

“We were ready for a footing inspection on the build, and then that got all washed in with mud, so it’s going to have to be cleaned out on Monday,” Waligura said. “The runoff came from over the hill straight across the site, where gravel and rebar were exposed since we were ready to pour concrete. We’ll have to get all the mud washed out and kind of start over.”

In addition to flooded basements, businesses along the National Road also received mud and debris around the outside of their buildings from the flooding. DeFranco Financial Owner Dustin DeFranco said his building received “some very minor water” in the basement that came down the road from a clogged storm drain in front of Altenheim Retirement Community.

“We came down last night, and water was just gushing out of the storm drain below the Altenheim sign,” DeFranco said. “Some pieces of almost 4×4 timbers were coming down the road. The force of water is amazing, but this was really nothing compared to what happened in Triadelphia.”

DeFranco was working with DeFranco Financial Advisor Paul Barnette to clean up rocks and debris from their parking lot and pressure wash mud from the front sidewalk of their building.

“We had some very minor water in the basement from the water that washed down through here from the culvert up top,” DeFranco said. “We’re just going to do a little pressure washing, sweeping and cleaning up the debris. Again, we’re lucky.”