Severe thunderstorms and flash flooding sent a reported landslide down Mercer Road near Butler Memorial Park Wednesday night, inundating homes, businesses and roads with water and mud, and causing an undetermined amount of damage to the park and private property on Butler's West End.

Butler Public Works employees at the park on Thursday morning said the flooding had carried everything from picnic tables to a telephone pole down the hillside and into the park. The waters also washed away a portion of a culvert and access road that loops around the park, the workers said.

Butler police Deputy Chief David Adam said two metal trash boxes also were swept away down Sullivan Run through the city's Island section.

Councilwoman Kathy Kline said a number of people also had to be rescued from the MGT building at the rear of the park, after a tree fell and blocked the park entrance.

The park was only one of hundreds of properties affected by the flood, Kline said. She said city workers continued to pump water from basements, remove trees from fences, and clean up a mudslide that inundated some buildings along Cunningham Street and covered the road and sidewalks with as much as half an inch of mud making footing treacherous.

Several business owners along the road were out cleaning up the mess Thursday morning, but declined to comment. Places like The Medicine Shoppe appeared to have escaped flooding by virtue of being at higher elevations, while other shops, like Battery Warehouse, had mud and inventory scattered across the floor after being flooded.

Kline said it was impossible to estimate the scope or cost of the damage this morning, but pledged the city would continue to work to help people recover.

“I think it's going to be substantial,” she said. “We probably have a good 200 homes that had flooding (and) various things that water damaged. The departments will continue to work and clean up until we can get everybody back in their homes and some sense of normalcy back in their lives.”

That mission was being shared by the Red Cross, which set up a relief shelter at the city fire department to aid people displaced by the flood and was preparing this morning to send out teams of people to assess the damage.

Will Wilhelm, the disaster program specialist for the Red Cross' West Central Chapter, said about eight people had visited the shelter as of 8:30 a.m. today. That's as Wilhelm was preparing to brief the Red Cross disaster assessment teams, which he said would be fanning out across the western part of the city and recording information about damage to homes and property. Wilhelm said information gathered by the teams, made up of between 12 and 20 people, would be shared with local authorities as cleanup efforts continue. The teams also would have prepackaged “cleanup kits” containing soap, washcloths, mops and other materials; Wilhelm said those kits, as well as food, water and other necessities, would be available at the shelter as well.

He said the organization was considering whether to establish an around-the-clock shelter in the city to help people affected by the flooding, but no final decision had been made.

“We really don't know. We're going to be here as long as people need us,” Wilhelm said. “We're here to assist the people of the city.”

County emergency services workers also were planning to do their own assessment of damage and the hardest-hit areas today, said director Steve Bicehouse. He said the vicious conditions Wednesday night had made it impossible for emergency workers to get a good sense of the extent of the damage.

“We got a lot of calls, all along the Sullivan's Run tributary in the city and the township,” Bicehouse said. “Right now we don't know the extent of the damage.”