Receding waters
We were very lucky here in Des Moines, except for the people in Birdland, where a levee blew out. North high school and the residential area around it got hit pretty hard. The rest of the city largely escaped the flooding.
We went down and joined the flood gawkers Thursday night. Here is Rob, across from the Simon Estes amphitheater. If you look closely, there are little balls just above the water. Those are lamps that rise from the stage. Theay are as tall as the white lamps on the bank. That gives you an idea of how high the water is. Click on the picture for a better view.
While the Des Moines river reached the levels of the 1993 floods, the Raccoon, which meets the Des Moines in downtown, had only about half the volume as the 1993 peak - well above flood stage, but just low enough to avoid catastrophe here.
Not so in Cedar Rapids or Iowa City. The Cedar River was 11 feet above its record high, devastating downtown. 400 blocks are underwater. Even the students at Coe had to be evacuated to Cornell.
In Iowa City, a large part of campus is underwater, including Hancher Auditorium. That river peaked yesterday.
We moved the file server out of our office Friday afternoon after the city ordered a voluntary evacuation. We had made arrangements to move it to a backup location in Altoona, and we were planning to try to work out of our houses, if the downtown levees failed and our building lost power. Fortunately the waters receded, and we were able to put everything back yesterday.
Meanwhile we celebrated Dan's birthday Friday (after he helped move the computer equipment out) and Fathers day yesterday. It was a nice weekend for us, with minimal flood impact. Not so much for all of those poor people in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City.
The river level in Iowa City peaked yesterday. Hancher Auditorium was hip deep in water.
We went down and joined the flood gawkers Thursday night. Here is Rob, across from the Simon Estes amphitheater. If you look closely, there are little balls just above the water. Those are lamps that rise from the stage. Theay are as tall as the white lamps on the bank. That gives you an idea of how high the water is. Click on the picture for a better view.
While the Des Moines river reached the levels of the 1993 floods, the Raccoon, which meets the Des Moines in downtown, had only about half the volume as the 1993 peak - well above flood stage, but just low enough to avoid catastrophe here.
Not so in Cedar Rapids or Iowa City. The Cedar River was 11 feet above its record high, devastating downtown. 400 blocks are underwater. Even the students at Coe had to be evacuated to Cornell.
In Iowa City, a large part of campus is underwater, including Hancher Auditorium. That river peaked yesterday.
We moved the file server out of our office Friday afternoon after the city ordered a voluntary evacuation. We had made arrangements to move it to a backup location in Altoona, and we were planning to try to work out of our houses, if the downtown levees failed and our building lost power. Fortunately the waters receded, and we were able to put everything back yesterday.
Meanwhile we celebrated Dan's birthday Friday (after he helped move the computer equipment out) and Fathers day yesterday. It was a nice weekend for us, with minimal flood impact. Not so much for all of those poor people in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City.
The river level in Iowa City peaked yesterday. Hancher Auditorium was hip deep in water.
posted by Joe at 5:40 AM
1 Comments:
This was a pretty bad flood. I have friends whose businesses in Cedar Rapids are all flooded and parts of my poor dear Iowa City were flooded. I'm so glad the worst is over. Now it's clean up and check the insurance policy time.
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