DICKSON, Tenn. (WTVF) — In his lifetime, Charles Lambert has seen a lot. "The floodwater will scare you," he said. "I'm a 70-year-old and I've never been scared of nothing."
But Saturday he woke up with that floodwater at his door.
"When they came to us they told us 'you got to go,' and they pulled the boat up and we went," said Lambert.
He and his wife quickly grabbed what they could, but had to leave two important things behind. "I got my little puppy dog and I got my little pooky cat," he said.
For now, they're calling the Dickson YMCA emergency shelter home. Later in the evening, a tornado warning brought more residents seeking shelter.
"We're planning on more coming in because they will allow folks from Humphreys County and Houston County come if they need to and as some of these floodwaters receded we may have some folks that are still here in the county that finally wind up making it here," said Rob Fisher with Dickson County Emergency Management.
Dickson County emergency crews responded to 15 water rescue calls Saturday morning using four water rescue teams.
"The next few days are going to be busy for all of us," said Fisher. "We'll be out of course repairing our infrastructure, we had a lot of road damage throughout the county, we had several bridges that had extensive damage, a lot of culverts and going in and out of driveways have been washed away." He said debris was also an issue along with landslides in the southwestern corners of the county.
Still, Dickson residents didn't waste any time to help their neighbors. "When I would go outside the cars that were just coming and dropping off all kinds of donations- waters, snacks, I was amazed with that," said Shelly Lambert.
The Lamberts do not know what's become of their home or even where they'll sleep the rest of the week, but they say they're happy things aren't worse. "Don't take a day for granted because you never know what's happening tomorrow," said Charles Lambert.
