‘I can’t replace it again.’ Flooding batters isolated pockets in Eastern Kentucky
FLEMING-NEON, Ky. — Bonnie Kincer has rebuilt the little flower shop and dance studio she owns on Main Street in Fleming-Neon twice, after destructive Eastern Kentucky floods tore through the old theater building in 2022 and again in 2025.
On Friday morning, as she surveyed the damage from another round of overnight flash flooding, Kincer broke down in tears. She said she doesn’t know if she can rebuild a third time.
“I can’t replace it again,” she said as her daughter braced her for the sight of her life’s work covered in mud. “We’ve had to replace everything twice before now. I just can’t do it again.”
Kincer is among hundreds of Eastern Kentuckians who awoke Friday to an all-too-familiar sight: overflowing gutters and ditches, mud and debris spilling from stream beds and flooding streets, businesses and homes.
Torrential rains have pounded a roughly 100-mile stretch of Eastern Kentucky between Stanton and Jenkins for days, as a high-pressure system over the Plains has pushed sporadic weather systems southward across Central and Eastern Kentucky. More excessive rain is expected Friday night, with sensitive areas of Breathitt, Floyd, Knott and Letcher counties facing a slight risk of continued flooding, according to the National Weather Service in Jackson.
For residents who lived through the region’s deadly floods in 2022 and 2025, the latest storms have brought a familiar anxiety. Mountain streams can rise and fall with startling speed with each passing storm.
“Every time it starts raining, whether it’s sprinkling or pouring rain, people get really nervous,” said Fleming-Neon Mayor Ricky Burke. “We’re in this rebuilding cycle over and over again, and, eventually, people leave.”
Dozens of residents left Fleming-Neon after the 2022 floods, Burke said. As he oversaw crews cleaning up several blocks of downtown Friday, he worried the latest flooding could shrink his little city even further.
The rains battered the region Wednesday, covering Fleming-Neon streets with several feet of water by early Thursday morning. Many residents and business owners had just finished clearing debris from that round of flooding when the rain began again Thursday evening, sending water through glass storefronts and down narrow side streets hemmed in by the headwaters of the Kentucky River.
Emergency workers evacuated some homes and rescued stranded drivers overnight between Fleming-Neon and McRoberts and in other low-lying areas beneath Pine Mountain in Letcher County and near Hindman in Knott County, according to first responders.
Letcher County Public Schools delayed the start of classes until Monday as nearly 1,000 residents woke up without power Friday. Floyd County, Knott County, Letcher County and Jenkins Independent schools also canceled classes Friday.
Emergency management officials who spoke to the Herald-Leader on Friday cautioned that flooding in pockets of Eastern and Southeastern Kentucky had not reached the widespread levels seen in 2022 and 2025. But they warned that more flooding remained possible as additional rain moved through the region.
“It’s scary,” said Aaron Polis, who lives in a home along Main Street in Fleming-Neon.
Polis spent Friday morning pumping water from his basement garage. But after watching the water rise and fall repeatedly this week, he said he doesn’t know whether he should expect to be doing it all over again Saturday.
“It’s done this over and over again,” he said. “And it’ll probably do it more.”
Staff writer Valarie Honeycutt Spears contributed to this report.