Spring Time is Flood Time

[hotrod]

3 million sandbags in 6 days, not too shabby!!!

[hotrod]

The weather channel is broadcasting from my work today! lololol
If you see footage from Mike Seidell hes standing between the railroad bridge and the main avenue bridge in fargo looking at moorehead...

[Miriam C.]

The weather channel is broadcasting from my work today! lololol
If you see footage from Mike Seidell hes standing between the railroad bridge and the main avenue bridge in fargo looking at moorehead...

Hey guys it looks like at least it is not going to rain....keep up the reports cause we are here with you. From here it looks like those big sand bags don't work as well with river water. Something for them to work on.

Be warm and safe.

[hotrod]

any news fom up north bigwoods???

[conbrio]

just ran across this website of pics from the Red River

[Bigwoods]

hotrod and everyone,

We are still dry at the moment and our crest come in the next few days. The closest town is Oslo, and it is now a little island sitting in the middle of the Red River. It has a ring dike around it and the Corps is adding 2' of clay to the top of the dike.

The problem is that the bridge, which may incur structural damage, has a 4 mile ice jam behind it forcing the water out into the surrounding area. We live 3 miles down the highway (or 3 sections of land) and the water is flooding those sections. If it comes out one more section we will be in trouble. An old timer told me he would guarantee, in writing, we would not flood. I did find that reassuring. Kinda.

We can not go anywhere for a few days as all the roads are closed with water over them. I could make a desperate 4X4 run if I had to get away.

The good news is that Fargo in now down one foot and the waters in between is not rising as fast as predicted, thanks to the cold weather.

So, I will stay in touch. hotrod and dakotamouse are in for another blizzard Tues.-Wed. We will get some, but not as much snow here.
They will get maybe another 10".

I was sandbagging a neighbors today and kept daydreaming about fishin', campin' and thirsting for some ice cold lemonade. Instead, I threw a bag tried to warm my hands and was thankful when I was handed a hot chocolate.

Greg

[hotrod]

mmmm lemonade and fresh walleye sounds good...
No work for me tommorow and possibly tuesday, will see I guess, think its gonna be touch and go for a few weeks. hat a mess... Hang tough, your in our thoughts and prayers bigwoods!! Hope you got enough supplies stashed in the house to go a few days..
Paul

[drafter]

Bigwoods, Thanks for posting. I was curious how you were doing up there. The news I got was everything around Oslo was under water. I am glad you are still dry.

Hotrod, It is good news the water is starting to drop for you. Unfortunately it looks as if you are going to get more snow on top of the mess you already have.

The Red Lake River in Crookston has dropped to around 20 feet. All the Emergency Centers in town are shut down for now. Take care and stay dry.

[Bigwoods]

drafter,

The town is an island. The road in and out is flooded and patrolled by the Guard. Actually I was there in 1997 and in a weird way I miss that. We were isolated for about 8 weeks inside the dike. Of course we watched the TV with the devastation in Grand Forks.

My wife and I would walk the dike in the middle of the night and did our share of "guarding " the town. This is kinda sick, but to pass the time we thought, due to the unusual circumstances, it was the ideal situation for a murder mystery.

We found a dead coon on the dike so that was our "body." We decided it was a young female victim.

What was fun about it was the cast of characters we had to draw from. Of course this was all in good fun to past the time and the occupations and characters in no way cast aspersions on the fine folks of Oslo.


You had the Mayor Ole who walked with a limp, the Banker, a fine family man, the Pastor, the Civil Defense leader, the Car salesman and the different Guardsmen and several others.

It was silly thing to do but past the time walking around the dike for hours. It was very eerie to walk all over town because why drive and be in a hurry. Only 380 fine folks live there.

We were fortunate that we kept power on, the grocery store got food brought in by the NG and we had mail service by boat. The only thing that ran short was gasoline. It was strange.

That is when an older couple from Grafton were on our side of the Red and tried to cross somewhere and were washed away and drown.

I will take a few more days off and try to go back after the snow storm if we don't have water problems.

Greg

[drafter]

I think some of us make life more busy than it needs to be. Sometimes it takes a situation like this to force us to slow down. It really is funny how a bad thing like a flood can really bring people together when a few weeks ago couldn't stand being around each other. Even in a little town, we do have a separation of ethnic groups and it takes a situation like this to bring everyone together. The mayor of Fargo just said the same thing on this mornings report.

[dakotamouse]

Woke up this morning to 15 inches more of snow....
Honestly I think we have more than enough water around here. Unfortunately this storm system is now on its way to Fargo.

Sheeesh! Enough is Enough!

[Bigwoods]

Hang in there drafter & dakotamouse and hotrod too. If a few weeks we may be able to look back and smile about all this. We are watching a dike real close. Still thinking the best for us, but we are being vigilant.

Dakotamouse,

I just heard on the radio you had 4' foot drift at the airport and things were going to get worse. Take Care. I hope your water problem has past.

[hotrod]

HEY !!!! keep this snow out there! I got snowflakes the size of quarters coming down, its actually quite pretty when it comes straight down vs the normal high plains sideways with an order of wind...

[Bigwoods]

hotrod,

It will be sideways in the AM, probably in big clumps.

[hotrod]

I just cleaned off the deck and the driveway so the wife could get out to go to work and it was quite brisk. I was suprised there wasnt more of a drift. I would imagine by the end of the day Ill have to blow tho. Did I just hear right? Evacuations in pembina?