Sunday, March 29, 2009

Fargo Flood 2009




By now I am sure you have heard and seen pictures and stories from our historic ongoing flood. The Red River runs through Fargo and right now it is 22 feet (or 2 stories) deeper than normal. It remains a scary time for the city but we pray the worst is over. The river has crested and now we hope the massive dike system will hold over the coming days. Don't worry though, we actually live in West Fargo and are far enough away from the river to keep us dry. Things were more stable today so we were able to walk across the Main Avenue bridge over the Red River and take a few pictures.



We had to build over 3 million sandbags and it has been a true community effort. The college kids from the 3 local universities, high school kids and middle school kids truly stepped up. Everyone we know has played some part in this, even Steve. He helped sandbag in a neighborhood of an adjacent community. These are right next to the river and help form a 2nd line of defense.





There are thousands of Minnesota and North Dakota National Guard soldiers here. This soldier is patroling the river and watching for any leaks in the earthen or sandbag dikes.











The city had to build miles and miles of earthen dikes like this around the city. Everything had to be able to withstand 42 feet of water.












Although not a great picture, this shows you our VA hospital and the tenuous position they are in behind the main dike. I am not sure but I would guess they evacuated the patients. Our main hospital evacuated all its patients by air and ambulance a few nights ago.







It's really hard to show you how deep the water really is without having some reference point. This stairway normally leads down to a walkway that runs along side the river.






I guess we would just ask that you continue to keep our family, our city and our state in your thoughts and prayers but try to not worry about us.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thoughts and prayers - of course . . . not to worry - impossible.
- Dad