FORT KENT – Piles of trash, wood scraps, branches and workbenches littered the back and side yards of David Soucy and Lise Pelletier’s East Main Street home Friday morning as they started the cleanup at their home which they were forced to evacuate earlier this week when the St. John and Fish rivers surged over their banks.

The couple was among more than 600 residents of more than 100 flooded homes who were allowed to return Friday as the rivers receded much faster than anticipated, falling below flood stage a day after reaching the highest levels ever recorded at Fort Kent.

Gov. John Baldacci, who visited the region for a second time Friday, issued a formal request to President Bush for a disaster declaration for Aroostook County.

The St. John River, which topped out above 30 feet early Thursday, fell to below 24 feet on Friday.

Police Chief Kenneth Michaud said Main Street was reopened to traffic after the town’s earthen dike passed an inspection by the Army Corps of Engineers, and people were heading back to their homes to pump out their cellars and assess damage in areas that were flooded Wednesday and Thursday. Businesses can’t open until they get clearance from the health inspector and homeowners need to have their houses inspected before the power can be turned back on.

Fort Kent Town Manager Don Guimond said the public water system was safe, but he urged residents with private wells to have their water tested before drinking any.

Sewage, heating fuel from flooded tanks, and other hazardous wastes may have found their way into the ground water, he warned.

Water testing kits are available at town offices in affected communities. Also, three donated tractor-trailer loads of water were trucked into northern Maine. Packages of bottled water donated by Hannaford and Poland Springs are available at sites throughout the affected communities.

Aroostook County Emergency Measures Director Vern Ouellette urged residents to call an emergency line, 211, to get information on assistance.

Baldacci decided Friday to move ahead with his disaster request after touring the region in a helicopter with the regional director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. All four members of Maine’s congressional delegation also got an aerial tour on Friday, and all promised to seek federal aid to begin rebuilding the infrastructure in the St. John Valley and other parts of the state affected by overflowing waterways.

In his letter to the president, Baldacci estimated that more than 200 homes have been damaged and between 600 and 1,000 people were displaced from their homes.

“I have determined that this incident is of such severity and magnitude that effective response is beyond the capabilities of the state and the affected local governments and that supplementary federal assistance is necessary,” the governor wrote.

In spite of the damage, no injuries were reported.

For the state to qualify for federal aid, the damage has to reach $1.6 million, said Lynette Miller of the Maine Emergency Management Agency. Although the heaviest damage was in Aroostook County, there was damage elsewhere in the state, as well, she said.

Art Cleaves, the regional FEMA chief, told the governor that he felt the state would easily reach the threshold, said David Farmer, Baldacci’s spokesman.

Many roads and bridges were damaged by the heavy rainfall Tuesday and ensuing floods.

In Fort Kent, the International Bridge connecting Maine and New Brunswick, remained closed on Friday, but a team from the Maine Department of Transportation and an inspector from Canada planned to inspect the bridge Saturday morning.

They want to make sure that the two-lane bridge wasn’t moved from its supports by the fast-moving waters before allowing it to be reopened, said Mark Latti, an MDOT spokesman.

Routes 1 and 161 and most of Route 11 were said to be passable for the first time in days. Since early Wednesday morning, communities west of Fort Kent had been marooned by floodwaters over Route 161. East of town, Fort Kent, Frenchville and Madawaska were similarly cut off from each other by flooded roadways.

At noon Friday, the only roadways that were not reopened were Route 1A south of Van Buren and Route 11 in Moro Plantation, located in southern Aroostook where a bridge was destroyed.

Food, medical supplies and even people in need of medical attention were transported in and out of isolated areas Wednesday and Thursday by helicopters from the Maine Forest Service and the U.S. Coast Guard.

The record flows of Aroostook County rivers were fueled in part by melting snow from a record snowfall this winter. Nearly 200 inches of snow fell, surpassing a more than 50-year-old record set during the winter of 1954-1955.

Rivers and streams throughout The County swelled well beyond their banks with the runoff and 31/2 inches of rain that fell on Tuesday.

The water line of the floodwaters was readily evident on David Soucy’s and Lise Pelletier’s home just inches from the first floor on the exterior of the two-story wood frame house.

Unlike many of their neighbors, Soucy and Pelletier were fortunate because the water did not rise into their living quarters. Still, they were forced to evacuate at 2 a.m. Wednesday because no one knew when the water would stop rising.

Roger Saucier, an electrician, had been called to the couple’s home late Tuesday to check the electrical system and turn the power off.

Pelletier recalled Friday that as they were preparing to evacuate Saucier asked them where they were planning to stay.

Then “he called his wife [Doris] and said we have people coming over. That was that. We had a place to stay,” Pelletier said.

Soucy, an attorney in town for most of the last 28 years, took the disaster in stride. The home where three generations of Soucys have lived still had no power and the casing on the furnace was cracked by the water.

“It’s a hell of a mess, but it could have been a lot worse,” he said.

Despite the disaster he, his neighbors and the town had gone through in the previous 60 hours, Soucy said he was proud of the community where he grew up.

“People really, really pulled together in this town the last few days,” he said. “Everyone was helping everyone, no matter what they were into themselves. It’s a very special community.”

With the sun shining bright, he added, “Look at the beautiful day. It’s a good drying day.”

Just west of the Soucy home, Tim Desjardins and Dale Roy had friends and family helping them at the Schoolhouse Apartments. The four-story structure was formerly St. Louis Elementary School, which included a convent for nuns of the St. Louis Catholic Parish.

Outside the structure, tow trucks were removing cars that had remained in the floodwaters. A huge 10-horsepower pump with a three-inch line steadily pushed water out of the basement of the building.

Electricians and heating technicians were inside checking things, and Michael Levesque was removing gravel and mud from the parking lot with a four-wheel drive tractor with a front-loader. They were even using the stream of water from the pump to clean the hot-topped parking lot in front of the building.

The building also housed a Headstart education center and a 3,000 square-foot day care center.

Desjardins said the complex was insured for flooding. He estimated the cost of cleanup and repairs at about $250,000.

“Nobody got hurt, and that’s the important thing,” Desjardins said. “We really need to thank the fire department who showed up here with 60 people when it was time to evacuate people.

“They were all here in under and hour,” he said of the volunteer fire department. “They helped everyone out, and thanks to them things are as good as they are.”

David Sharp of The Associated Press contributed to this report.