While in Boston, I called Margaret and got these reports on
the weather:
Monday – it
rained, and a lot – it is so wonderful.
Tuesday – it
rained again – some pretty good storms.
Wednesday – more
rain
Problem was that this wonderful rain set the stage – the
ground was saturated when the BIG one came.
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| Neighborhood flooding in Longmont |
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| A footbridge over Lefthand Creek - it is interesting to not that generally this bridge has 8 feet of clearance over a babbling little brook. |
Wednesday evening into Thursday
morning it rained between 6 and 8 inches in Boulder County in 15 hours. The ground could not absorb it so it raced as
flash floods down the canyons into the cities.
·
Boulder was the first hit because it is at the
mouth of a canyon. It was enough to
close down Boulder – including CU. Boulder got most of the press that day
because it was a well known city.
·
In Jamestown,
up in the mountains, buildings along the river collapsed claiming the first
victim of the flood.
·
In Estes
Park up in the mountains, the St. Vrain river went over its banks and
flooded downtown and tore up street. By
the end of the flood, all entry into Estes Park was gone – all highways were
damaged beyond usability – except Trail Ridge Road through Rocky Mountain
National Park.
·
The St. Vrain River then proceeded down to Lyons – accompanied by the contents of
a few earthen dams and flooded that small foothill city. The city was left in shambles with every
bridge and many of the roads destroyed.
As the flood progressed, the National Guard was called out to rescue
people in Lyons using heavy weight high profile vehicles.
·
The St. Vrain River then proceeded down into Longmont (my town). On Thursday, all of the bridges over the
river were closed. 7000 households were
evacuated because of the raging rising water.
To make matters in Longmont worse, Lefthand Creek, the creek that
damaged Jamestown and left it isolated, also runs through Longmont to join the
St. Vrain just East of the city. It
caused neighborhoods to be evacuated and it closed all of the roads. These two rivers split the city into three
parts and isolated the city from the outside world. Schools were closed an
people who were not evacuated were told to “shelter in place”, meaning stay
home.
·
Further north, Loveland and Ft. Collins
were also having flooding problems on the Big Thompson and Poulder Rivers.
·
Heavy rains also caused flooding in the Denver
Metro area and down in Colorado Springs.
But Boulder County was the worst.
It was weird in Longmont because there were parts of the
city that were devastated – yet parts of the city were just getting a lot of
rain and all was fairly normal. And no
one could really get around in the devastated areas to really see what was
going on.
And it kept on raining – and the rivers kept rising and the
destruction continued.
Friday – it continued to rain, but not as hard as before –
and there were breaks. The river levels
would fluctuate depending on what time of day it was and where it was raining
in the mountains. Things started getting
worse in Loveland and Ft. Collins. I 25
from Denver to Cheyenne, Wyoming was close for fear that the bridges would
collapse. The main roads in Longmont
were still closed. Suddenly national
newscasters shifted their focus from Boulder to Lyons, Longmont and Estes park
where more damage was being done. The
National Weather Service used the term “Biblical” to describe the flooding. Normally they use the term”100 year flood”,
but “500 year flood was being bandied around.
Some statistics show the overwhelming power of the storm:
·
Average rainfall in Boulder County is 14.61
inches per year. By Friday afternoon,
Boulder Country had received 14.5 inches in 5 days.
·
September rainfall in Boulder County averages
1.6 inches – 1i 15 hours Wednesday night and Thursday morning, Boulder County
got 7.5 inches.
·
The most rainfall in a September day before this
storm in Boulder County was 3.5 inches – in 1905.
·
The most rainfall ever in one day in Boulder County
was 4.05 inches – in July of 1919.
·
And before this storm, the Colorado Front Range
populace area was officially designated as a drought area.
And it kept on raining – but the river levels stabilized and
some of the evacuated residents were allowed back into their homes. National Guard helicopters were brought in
during any break in the storm for rescue missions into the mountains. Bridges in Longmont were still closed.
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| National Guard in Lyons |
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| National Guard in Lyons |
Saturday I came
home from Boston. And Saturday the storm
began to break. I 25 was open by the
time I got home in the afternoon. The
river bridges in Longmont on Main Street and Hover Avenue were opened – where
the day before they all had water running over them. And there were long periods of storm break
when rescues could be accomplished. More
evacuated families returned to their homes and some clean up was started.
But it still kept on raining.
Sunday we went to
an abbreviated church meeting and then a disaster relief planning meeting. And during that meeting it rained as hard as
it had at any time. People left early so
they could get home in case the bridges closed again. The rivers rose a little but warning were
that rain in the mountains could still bring crests in the rivers in the
evening.
And then down river flooding started. Flooding from Lefthand
Creek ran into the flooded St. Vrain River. Flooding from Boulder Creek ran
into the St. Vrain River. The St. Vrain
River then ran into the South Platte River that was already carrying all of the
water from the Denver area. Then the
Flooding Big Thompson River joined the South Plat and then the Poulder river
joined the South Plate just before that river reached Greely. Flooding in Greely was catastrophic. This crest would continue for the next week
as the flood waters crested into other little communities downstream on the
plains.
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| Greeley |
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| Greeley area farm |
Monday it didn’t rain.
Tuesday it didn’t rain. River
levels receded. People started cleaning
out their flooded homes. But some cities
are just too broken. Many people from
Lyons have been told they will not be able to get to their homes for at least a
month. Estes Park is cut off. And even though the rivers are back in their
banks, they are still at flood level depths.
It is now Wednesday – one week after the real flooding
began. The ground is still very
saturated. The rivers are high –
And it just started raining again – but it was a real good
thunderstorm and then it stopped.
How were we affected?
Mar has become a point of contact for our ward in the church. Our ward has most of the Longmont river flood
plain in our boundaries, so we had a lot of concern. Mar made calls and later became the reporting
person for relief service given.
We know a family who was evacuated. We offered to let them stay with us, so we
had their parents and four children staying for a few nights while the water
receded in their neighborhood.
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| The neighborhood where our evacuees live |
Mat brought Andrew and Mylie down on Monday to help with
clean up. They worked in a flooded
neighborhood over by Lefthand Creek helping to clean out basements.
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| Cleaning up flooded houses |
Breanne came over with a friend on Tuesday. They both left their babies for Mar to watch
while they went and helped in a neighborhood down the hill from us that was
flooded by the St. Vrain River.
We did other little things to help.
It has been an incredible week. When we talk about preparedness, many think
it can’t happen here. That is what we
thought. This was so unexpected and
unpredictable. Cleanup has started and
the amount of freely offered volunteer work happening in Boulder County is
incredible. But the damage to the
infrastructure is devastating – bridges, roadways and railroad tracks are
gone. And the damage to business and
private property is staggering.
We are blessed. It
wasn’t in winter which would have equated to about 8 feet of snow. It was warm.
There was immediate response. One
of the great blessings was that Longmont had just finished a 6,000,000 dollar
project to prepare Lefthand Creek for flood control. It was not designed for anything of this
magnitude, yet for the most part it still worked. The Lefthand Creek bridges all held, despite
the fact that the river ran over the top of all of them. The channel hel, despite the fact that it was
severely widened. While everyone laughed
and complained about the time and cost, it has now proved to be worth it.
And there is another residual effect. Whenever it starts to rain, everyone holds
their breath.
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