Patton resident Jason Helbig looks over the waters flowing at the Chest Creek dam Tuesday. Borough officials urged residents to head to higher ground Monday as fears of a dam breach grew. The dam held and evacuated residents returned home Tuesday. Mirror photo by Matt Churella

PATTON — Hours after heavy rain flooded several homes, Patton officials told residents to evacuate because of fears of a dam breach.

On Monday afternoon, water from rain-swollen Little Chest Creek flooded parts of the borough. But hours later, residents learned they weren’t out of danger.

“This is Patton Borough. The Chest Creek dam is in jeopardy of breaching. If able, please evacuate. Get to higher ground immediately,” said an automated telephone message about 10 p.m. sent from officials.

After that warning, at least 20 residents gathered along a Magee Avenue bridge over Chest Creek to observe the water flow downstream from the dam, about 287 yards away.

Mayor Jonathan Welchko said the automated warning was sent for precautionary reasons after Chest Creek had been deemed unsafe about 10 p.m. Monday.

“We did it for precautionary (reasons). But before, it wasn’t coming over the tracks, now it is. It’s coming up over the tracks up there, and we don’t know how much more it’s going to come up over. That’s what has us worried, and that’s why we did that to evacuate them,” he said Monday night.

Welchko said senior citizens from Arotin’s Hum­ming­bird Estate were evacuated by Patton firefighters to Queen of Peace Parish Center. He also said that borough officials are going to be busy taking action to ensure residents’ safety over the coming days.

“Oh yeah, yes, they will,” Welchko said of officials keeping busy. “I’m just hoping everything is OK, you know. I don’t want to see no homes go. I hope it recedes, but it’s just getting up more and more.”

Robin Zungali was among the residents who stood Monday night on the bridge over Chest Creek.

“No, we’re not evacuating. We’re staying put. We just bought this house almost two years ago, and I’m not leaving it. The only way I’m going to leave is if it’s heading down the creek,” Zungali said of her desire to observe the creek water from outside her home. “I’m not crazy for not evacuating, just hopeful that nothing will happen and thank God for flood insurance.”

Zungali said she has lived next to Chest Creek for almost 40 years.

“We’re hoping this dam does not break because I live right next to the creek, and I’m hoping I don’t have to leave a flooded home. We’re just standing here waiting to see if anything’s gonna happen — hopefully not.”

She said she was concerned with the height of the creek but said she has seen it rise to higher levels in 1977 and again in the late 1990s.

Overnight, the creek’s height receded — both at Little Chest Creek, by about 7 feet, and at the Chest Creek dam, which had overflowed up to adjacent railroad tracks Monday night.

Arotin’s Hummingbird Estate owner Carolyn Arotin was in tears Tuesday morning as she described the evacuation process from the night before.

“Nobody got hurt, and our plan went into effect beautifully,” she said, adding that residents were served breakfast Tuesday morning. “They had a breakfast Father (Ananias) made for them, and they’re tickled because they had their breakfast up there with Father at the church. A few got to go home. (The American) Red Cross came, put up cots and asked us what all we needed.”

Arotin said her staff was up all night because of the evacuation.

“They still haven’t slept. Some of us have been going for over 24 hours. We’ve been very fortunate that these firemen are on top of things. But the big problem here is gonna be that dam behind me. There’s no reason for it,” Arotin said, adding that she plans to take her concerns to Borough Council members at an Aug. 14 meeting. “It used to be their water supply, and it’s not used for that; it’s used to go fishing, which is wonderful. But when you have structures and homes and people living here, and that’s gonna fill up and overflow and cause situations like this, I think something needs to be done permanently with that dam.”

“I have a lot of people that will back me, and we’re gonna do something about this dam. Lives are more important than anything else, and I hope this town feels that way,” Arotin said.

Queen of Peace volunteer worker Jan Gobert said the evacuated residents were asleep before workers left the parish center about 2 a.m.

“By midnight, they had everybody up here. They weren’t having any flooding issues at Hummingbird, but they were afraid that, if the dam broke, then they wouldn’t be able to get them out. They told the people all in that area apparently, but then it was up to them in their individual homes.”

Gobert said two ladies evacuated their homes to use the parish center. She said 13 residents from Hummingbird came to the parish Monday night, but only 10 of them stayed overnight.

“But once they got here, they had a good, restful night, and they just got the last of the residents back down there now,” she said about 10:30 Tuesday morning.

Meanwhile, borough officials called residents with another automated message to alert them that a dumpster had been placed at Patton Park for cleanup debris.

Cambria County Depart­ment of Emergency Ser­vices Deputy Director Art Martynuska gave an update on his report, which he started Monday afternoon.

“There’s a train that’s stopped on one of the rail tracks. It’s not compromised; the water had washed out part of the bedding for the railway. They separated the engines from the cargo, and they’re both in safe locations. So, the railroad, as it stands right now, is unusable until repaired.”

Martynuska said there had been other damage, as well.

“We’ve had road damage in many locations throughout the county. We have a couple bridges that the approaches may be compromised … and we have to wait and see about the bridges’ structural integrity.”

One of those bridges was Gooderham bridge, about 3 miles outside of Patton.

“The bridge is there, (but the) road is not,” said Gooderham Road resident Rosie Gooderham in a video of the damaged bridge that she posted on Facebook.

Gooderham said the bridge has not affected her ability to leave her home.

“We can enter Patton by using Eckenrode Mill Road and Carroll Road,” she said. “It is just a shortcut to use the bridge on our road. In six hours, the bridge went from barely covered to near completely underwater.”

Gooderham said her basement had been flooded, too.

“At this point, we can’t access our lower property, where the creek was flooded into our hayfields, due to the train sitting and blocking the crossing. We expect just a lot of debris that has been carried out into the field,” Gooderham said. “There is typically 10 acres of hay in that field; nearly three-fourths of it was underwater.”

Gooderham also said she was impressed with how fast the village of Eckenrode Mills came together to help.

“My husband had his skid loader out helping neighbors to clear ditches and culverts. Others were helping to pump out basements, rake driveways or just offer their help,” Gooderham said. “It makes me happy to live in such a great community.”