Storm debris cleanup in Bowling Green is finished, just more than two months after severe storms swept through southcentral Kentucky on Memorial Day weekend and brought heavy rain and flinging debris all over town.

According to a Facebook post from the City of Bowling Green, crews gathered 187 truckloads of debris incurred from the May 25-26 storms at a cost of $152,400.

Ryan Johnson, operations director for Bowling Green Public Works, told the Daily News this cost includes hours worked by crews along with equipment rentals. He said because the weather event was categorized as a state of emergency, BGPW hopes to receive some reimbursement of costs from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“We just kept that data to know what we spent in hopes that FEMA … will give us some type of reimbursement,” Johnson said. “If we do get the opportunity to get reimbursed from FEMA, then we’ve got all that information ready to go.”

Cleanup efforts in the city began June 10. Public Works Director Andy Souza told the Daily News in June that work on debris clearance was being hampered by breakdowns in equipment and non-storm related items being thrown in with debris piles.

This included construction materials, metal, and at one point, a dining room table and chairs. Johnson said since the Glen Lily Landfill in Bowling Green can only accept organic matter, these items could not be picked up and were left behind.

Johnson said in the aftermath of the Dec. 11, 2021, tornadoes, the debris field was mostly limited to a “straight line” through Bowling Green, running from Russellville Road to Cemetery Road. He said with debris from the storms in May and the March 2023 windstorm, the damage was more widespread.

Cleanup from the December tornadoes began in late December that year and finished up around six months later, he said.

“We started at Russellville Road and pretty much worked our way out Cemetery Road for the (tornadoes), just kind of mainly on the path of it,” Johnson said. “Both of the windstorms that we’ve had (since then) have been more widespread around the whole city.”

This, combined with issues over equipment breakdowns, prolonged the city’s cleanup from the Memorial Day storm. Johnson said the city rented a truck to aid in cleanup.

“We were running three (trucks) at one time, and there’d be a lot of times it would just be the rented one, and sometimes it’d just be two trucks,” Johnson said. “That puts a lot of wear and tear on our equipment when we’re picking up that much.”

Cleanup crews moved through 10 different zones across Bowling Green this summer, starting with the hardest hit areas and working downward.

Johnson said because workers did not revisit these zones after finishing, residents who still have debris will need to contact private companies to haul them away.