Bishop finds ‘something robust’ about victims of County flood

FORT KENT – The flood-waters that devastated Aroostook County last week deprived 81-year-old Hazel Martin of her home, her Bible, everything – except her faith. That’s why she positively beamed when she met Bishop Richard J. Malone on Friday.

“I feel so good. I feel like I am in heaven, really,” Martin said after she exchanged hugs and conversation with Malone at town hall. “He’s a good spirit builder.”

That’s precisely why Malone flew in from Portland on Friday – to console spirits devastated by losses incurred in the record flooding, which swept through 13 Aroostook County towns, including Fort Kent and the 16-unit senior citizen housing complex Martin lived in.

Malone said he was himself buoyed by the good spirits he encountered.

“There is something about these people,” Malone said Friday. “They are just determined to overcome and prevail. There’s something robust about them. A lot of it is probably the strong French Catholicism here that they come from.”

Malone toured St. Louis Catholic Church on East Main Street and St. Joseph Catholic Church in Soldier Pond after meeting with Martin and other flood survivors at town hall and at the senior housing complex.

In Fort Kent, the St. John River topped out early on May 1 above 30 feet, coming within 6 inches of spilling over the town’s earthen dike. Nonetheless, much of downtown flooded when the St. John and Fish rivers overflowed their banks. Parts of Clair, New Brunswick, on the other side of the St. John River flooded as well.

No one died, but early estimates place damage-repair costs in the tens of millions of dollars.