Mennonite Disaster Service has been responding to a repeat flood disaster in and around Barre, Vt., where volunteers have mucked out or repaired more than 50 homes.

Flooding hit the area July 10-11, 2023, when the Winooski River overflowed, sending water into hundreds of homes. The area was deluged again on the same dates this year with six inches of rain, re-flooding some of the same homes.

MDS volunteer Brent Trumbo, who was serving as a crew leader for two weeks, decided July 29 to take a photo at the end of a long day mucking out a flooded basement.

Trumbo, from Broadway, Va., attends Harrisonburg Mennonite Church, and is a longtime volunteer.

He was working with Old Order Mennonite volunteers from Dayton, Va., and the Lancaster County, Pa., area.

“I was dumbfounded when I saw what they were doing,” he said.

The women, most of whom were in their early 20s, were using shovels to fill five-gallon buckets with mud. They then carried one in each hand out of the basement of a 200-year-old home inundated with river mud.

“They were carrying about 40 pounds in each hand,” he said. “They did this for hours on end with no stopping and no slowing down.”

And they were singing while they worked.

“Their harmony was phenomenal,” Trumbo said. “You could have made a recording in that basement.”

He recalled getting a little teary-eyed Aug. 2 on his last day on the job.

“These were young people who were so hardworking. They were humble. They were very friendly, and they’d come over and chat with me for 20 minutes very comfortably,” he said. “They restored my hope in the next generation. That’s genuinely the way I feel. I get very emotional when I talk about it.”

Thousands of people viewed the photo on Facebook and Instagram. Some thought it must have been generated by artificial intelligence.

“People thought this was someone getting creative with AI,” said Trumbo, who would like to assure people that he’s a real human being.

The homeowner, who periodically brought snacks and drinks to volunteers in the basement, had a look of stunned surprise when he saw the work being accomplished.

“As we were leaving, I noticed that he had walked out into the yard and had just sat in a lawn chair, and it appeared like he was crying,” Trumbo said. “I am sure he was just in shock. It was a very touching moment.”