Crime & Safety
Photo/Video Gallery: Red Roof Inn Flood Rescues
Volunteer firefighters using boats rescued about 140 adults and children, as well as numerous pets, from the Red Roof Inn motel on Route 1 in Lawrence Township during Hurricane Irene Sunday morning.
Shortly before 8 a.m. on Sunday, Aug. 28, Lawrence Township emergency services descended upon the Red Roof Inn in the 3200 block of Brunswick Pike (Route 1) to evacuate motel occupants as a precaution because Hurricane Irene flood waters were rising fast in that area. Route 1 itself, near Interstate 95/295 just a little south of the motel, was already under water at that time.
Volunteer firefighters from the Lawrenceville, Lawrence Road and Slackwood fire companies used boats to ferry adults, young children and even pets from areas of the motel that were already flooded by several feet of water. Once out of the flood waters, evacuees were escorted to buses which transported them to Rider University. Once at the university’s gym, arrangements were made for them to reunite with relatives elsewhere or be transferred to an overnight Red Cross shelter at the West Trenton firehouse in Ewing Township.
Some residents who were reluctant to leave were gently persuaded to do so for their own safety by Lawrence Township police officers. Emergency medical service personnel assisted several people who had difficulty walking.
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Township officials estimated that about 140 people were evacuated to safety from the motel.
The Red Roof Inn was just one of many flooded locations in Lawrence Township from which volunteer firefighters rescued people during the hurricane on Sunday. Others locations were , the Sleep-E-Hollow motel and Mount’s Motel on Route 1, the Howard Johnson Motor Lodge on Route 1, , homes on Bakers Basin Road and pet kennels on Bakers Basin Road and Basin Road.
