Two area residents tragically swept away in flash flood in Manes area

Two Mountain Grove residents were reportedly swept away in flash flood waters this morning around 5 a.m. (Nov. 5) on Highway H in the area of Beaver Creek, two miles east of Manes.
Reportedly more than one car was swept off State Route H and emergency personnel started looking for those people.
Two people from one vehicle were confirmed to have escaped the flood waters.
Wright County Sheriff Sonny Byerley told the Wright County Journal that a drone was deployed to look for other people who were swept away.
At around 8:45 a.m., the drone discovered a deceased 70-year-old male and a 73-year-old female.
They would be later identified as Charles and Catherine Baldwin.
According to a Missouri State Highway Patrol Drowning Incident Report, both occupants of a vehicle attempted to swim to dry ground and drowned.
Wright County Coroner Ben Hurtt estimated their time of death to be just before 7 a.m.
The man and woman were reportedly poll workers in the Manes area.
Sheriff Byerley told the Wright County Journal there were six swift water rescue in the county during the rough storms that hit the area the evening of Nov. 4 through the early morning hours of Nov. 5.
(The obituaries for both Charles and Catherine Baldwin appear on pages A3 and A4 in this issue of the Wright County Journal.)