Stranded West Shokan residents evacuated across the Bushkill

Photo of evacuation on Watson Hollow Road, September 28, 2011, by Jeanette Giuliano Kahil. From Facebook album.

Earlier today, we reported that a man had fallen into the creek on Watson Hollow Road in West Shokan after trying to cross a temporary footbridge, and that he and several of his neighbors were still stranded behind the creek.

Martha Frankel, one of the stranded residents, spoke to us by phone on the Watershed Post's regular live radio show on WIOX this afternoon. When we spoke to her around 1:15pm, the Olive fire department was in the process of evacuating her and two neighbors with a ladder truck borrowed from Woodstock.

(Earlier today, Frankel told us that emergency first responders had offered to attempt a water rescue, but that the neighbors had declined. By early this afternoon, she said, the fire department insisted that they be evacuated.)

The Daily Freeman's Tania Barricklo was on the scene before the evacuations, and interviewed Olive fire chief Chris Winne in front of the raging Bushkill. Video below.