Ida apparently had a gentle side.

Heavy rainfall and high winds are usually a bad combination but the remnants of Tropical Storm Ida caused surprisingly little damage across Gaffney and Cherokee County.

“Actually, I expected it (the damage) would be a lot worse because of the saturated ground,” said Emergency Preparedness Director Rick Peterson. “It wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be.”

For the most part, damage was limited to a few downed trees and limbs that blocked roadways or fell on electrical lines. But most of the blockages and power losses were fixed in short order.

Overall, four roads had to be closed due to flooding problems but no major roadway damage was reported.

Among the roads closed following the downpour that lasted from Tuesday into Wednesday were Little Hope Road and River Road, both of which run along the Broad River, as well as North Cherokee Ford Road near Blacksburg and Chestnut Ridge Road in the Corinth area.

Peterson believed all of the roads had been reopened by Thursday.

“I think we ended up being lucky,” said City of Gaffney Public Workers Director Mike Teague “We didn’t have anything ... a few stopped-up drains but nothing major.”

Teague said he also expected the storm damage to be much worse.

Reports on the amount of rain dumped on Cherokee County varied greatly but there was no doubt it came down in proverbial buckets.

Peterson said local weather watchers reported anywhere from three inches to seven inches as the remnants of Ida passed through.

The drenching that the entire region experienced caused the Broad River to swell greatly, prompting the National Weather Service to issue a flood warning that was lifted at 4:18 a.m. Thursday.

Flood stage for the river monitoring station near Blacksburg is 16 feet. At this level, the river would begin to cover portions of River Road and farmland near the river.

According to the National Weather Service, the river crested at 15.4 feet at 12:30 a.m. and had fallen to 15.3 feet by 3 a.m. It continued falling throughout the day Thursday.

While the sun was in short supply during the storm, Peterson thinks he may have found a bright side to the situation.

“Hopefully, it cleared out what was going to fall when we have our first ice storm,” he said.