LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — Jim Peters has spent the last couple weeks camping in the Red River Gorge.
Something he's done quite a bit over the years.
"It’s just something I’ve always wanted to do. I love to come down here and just stay as long as I can and visit the different ridges and things like that," Peters said.
However, as he woke up Friday morning, he could tell the gorge was not the best place to be.
As storms blew through Kentucky from Hurricane Helene, dozens of trees came down throughout the camping grounds, including one falling on top of Peter's car.
“I guess I’m trapped in about a quarter mile stretch of the road. We’re about four miles into the forest," Peters said.
"I was sitting and heard large cracking and barely made it out of the way of this tree that’s come down. There’s at least 10-15 trees down."
Peters told LEX 18 he hadn't seen anything like this in 30 years of coming to the gorge.
Wind and rain trapped him and others in the area for hours.
“There’s a lady, she’s up the road a bit, I can’t get to her now. This morning when I checked on her she said she was okay but so many trees have come down since," Peters said.
Peters did reach out to Wolfe County Rescue but had to wait hours for the team to be able to get to him.
He was prepared to stay through the night if he had to.
"Car is almost out of gas because I’ve really just been navigating, trying to go where it’s safer but it doesn’t feel safe anywhere, not with this many trees. I have food and water because when I go camping I’m always prepared," Peters said.
"Someone suggested I shouldn't have stayed down here last night. I thought 'oh it's not going to be that bad' but in retrospect I should've left."
Thankfully, Peters told us later in the day that both he and the woman he saw had been rescued before the storms resumed Friday evening.
