Two Weeks Past The Fargo Crest

The Red River at Fargo is at 32.25 feet today, down 6.5 feet from the crest, but still 14 feet above flood stage and still in the major flood category. Not much excitement the last two weeks in Fargo itself. I took a walk today, since the sun finally came out. The Aquafence on the south side of El Zagal was gone, the flood wall across Elm Street at 15th was gone, and the dike at the east end of El Zagal was above water. A couple of large pumps were emptying the bowl in an attempt to get the golf course ready for play ASAP.

While the Red in Fargo gets recorded as the fourth highest historic flood, the Sheyenne River to the west, has been challenging the record 2009 levels. This includes the area just north (downstream) of Fargo where the Sheyenne joins the Red. Due to high levels of some tributaries in that area, there was major overland flooding. I-29 was closed for several days after the video below was taken.

Further west in Valley City, the heavier snows and rains led to Bald Hill dam being challenged. The US Corps of Engineers had to release large amounts of water to prevent the dam from being topped. The river at Valley City has been at high levels and for a while and it is supposed to have its second crest about now. Some scenes of Valley City and overland flooding elsewhere in the Sheyenne River watershed are seen in the video below.

The above video is by Lee Hoedl who has done some excellent work documenting the floods of the last three years. His work can be seen on his channel on Youtube including this year's 12 installments.

Crest Day?

by Dakota Noel

By 5:00 PM on Friday (yesterday), Fargo and Moorhead were announcing that flood preparations were pretty much done. The dump trucks with clay were absent from the streets on the drive home. The only flood prep I saw was the unloading of some contingency sandbags at El Zagal. 

I got my photos of Elm Street over the completed dike. The structure was about 3 feet high and the width of 14th Street. Signs reminded people to keep off the dikes. The police are very strict about enforcing dike laws. The water was up against the base on the river side.

The rate of the Red River's rise slowed on Friday and today hovered just above 38.7 feet, just a few inches short of the 1897 level. The 1897 flood (39.1 feet) held the record for 100 years, being surpassed in 1997 (39.7 feet) and again in 2009 (40.8 feet). Due to lack of flood forecasting and earth moving equipment in the 19th century, the flood was unmitigated and covered much of downtown.

Closer to home, two blocks west of Elm Street, the water was still about a foot below and several feet horizontal from the Aqufence. This confirmed the sidewalk as being at about 40 feet. On my walk home from El Zagal, I pondered the 41 foot level which would result in water the full 1200 feet between the golf course and my driveway if there was no barrier.

With no rain in the forecast, today would be Crest Day and the river would begin its slow decline. We do have rain in the forecast, up to 1.5 inches total in the area over the next 36 hours. The flood forecast in light of the weather forecast is that the river may go up slightly and then would stay at crest longer. Current preparations should easily handle the forecast rain, but the actual when and where and how much could combine to significantly change things. Hence the prepositioning of contingency sandbags to raise those dikes another foot. Other defenses such as clay dikes and the Aquafence are mostly at a height that could be handled by all but a freakish amount of rain.

Water and Water Barriers

by Dakota Noel

It was hard to get my river picture looking north on Elm Street today due to the on-going dike construction. Perhaps the best bench mark is that the water is now in front of the "Road Closed" sign. The gap being closed   is 14th Ave on the left and the entrance to Treefoil Park on the left. The river level is about 36 feet with 3-4 more feet go to crest this weekend. It looks like heavy weekend rains may go to the south, so that is good news.

With all the clay needed for the dikes, dump trucks are making up a significant amount of traffic. Sitting at a stoplight tonight on my way home, there were five also stopped or passing through the intersection while I waited. Red Cross and Salvation Army vehicles are also common as they bring food and water to sandbaggers.

There was a surprise at the end of the street tonight. Instead of a clay dike, there was an Aquafence which is made by a Norwegian company. A rep from the company, who was a native of Norway, was on site. While he was there to assist with installation by a local company, he fielded a lot of questions from neighborhood folks making their post-supper rounds. The system was tested locally in last year's flood in the Moorhead Center Mall parking lot.

The Aquafence is a series of braced panels which is clamped to the sidewalk. Also today, the east El Zagal dike was topped and the golf course has filled with water which can be seen in the upper right of the picture. The Aquafences shouldn't get too much of a workout since the projected crest is now 39-40 feet and the sidewalk is at 40. It's standard practice to protect to 2 feet above projected crest in case of prediction errors, ice jams, or heavy rains.

This picture is about the same view as one I posted yesterday with the new Aquafence in the foreground and the flooded golf course in the middle. The sandbagging in Fargo is pretty much done with the help of Fargo high school students and other volunteers. Based on outside sounds tonight, clay dike construction is still underway. The goal was to have everything done tomorrow for the weekend crest.

by Dakota Noel

The river was up to 33 feet today...a beautiful day which was out first above 50 F in 2011 and since November. This is another Elm Street shot looking north along the El Zagal golf course.

The top white line in the photo below is a line of sandbags, topping off a permanent dike on the west end of the golf course. The dike on the east end of the golf course should be topped tomorrow by the river  and the area in the foreground of the picture will fill in with river water.

Today they also started the clay dike on 14th Ave North. Based on the stakes, it looks like they are building it to 42 feet river gage. In this picture, it is about 3 feet high.

Staging Sandbags

By Dakota Noel

It had taken several weeks for the Red River to rise the 2 feet from its winter level to flood stage in March. Over the weekend, the river rose 5 feet and is on a 1-2 foot/day clip for the coming week en route to the crest. Whereas the river on Elm Street was hard to see in my picture from Friday, it is pretty easy to find today.

When I got home from work today, there was a three semi sandbag convoy parked on the south side of El Zagal. Then a group of eight tracked Bobcats came along.

The trucks and the skid-steers moved forward where a frenzy of unloading activity occurred. One image was that of piglets at a sow. Another was the shriner's little red convertables zipping around in a parade. These sandbags will be used to protect the Shriner's building and their cars.

It currently looks like the crest will be in about a week at 38-40 feet. This is lower than the 42-44 feet for which preparations had been made. Less diking will need to be done this week. High schoolers will still be released from school to help. Low bridges are starting to close and the downtown dike is being constructed on 2nd Street. 

A weather system in the area last weekend which had been forecast to drop up to an inch of liquid precipitation fizzled out and we didn't even get a sprinkle. Because we didn't get any snow which reflects light, the melt will be faster than forecast, but not excessively. We're headed to a top 5 historic flood with 3 of the 5 in the last 2 years (2009, 2010, and 2011). The other biggies were in 1897 and 1997.

The Month of the Flood has Arrived

by Dakota Noel

It was a beautiful late winter / early spring day today. A co-worker and I went for a walk at lunch and when I arrived home, I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood to check out the flood and flood preparations. There is still quite a bit of snow in our yard. We had about 1.5 inches of snow yesterday which moved the winter into 3rd snowiest on record and we've had continuous snow cover for 130 days now.

(Arbor notes: The tree on the boulevard on the left is our oak tree. The birch on the boulevard is not visible. The big tree on the right is our remaining elm tree which got a trim on Thursday when a crew was working on our street.)

Below is the corner at the end of our street, about 1200 feet north from my house. The sidewalk on the boulevard across the street is at about 40 feet river gage (22 feet above flood stage). I expect they will be putting a clay dike on 14th Avenue which is 2-6 feet high depending on what happens with the rain/snow this weekend and the corresponding update to the flood forcast. Beyond the boulevard, in what was perhaps an old river oxbow, is the 9-hole, par 3 El Zagal golf course. The dike on the east end of the course, not clearly visible in the photo, gets topped at about 35 feet and the bowl will fill in. This brings the river to within a block and a half of our house.

Up until 2009, clay dikes and sandbag dikes were the staples of flood fighting. In 2009, Hesco barriers were first used. They make up a large part of the barrier on the west end of El Zagal. It looks like the "ring" outside the El Zagal shrine is marked for sandbagging. Sand bags are scheduled to be distributed where needed starting Tuesday of next week.

At the southeast corner of El Zagal, a front end loader was just finishing a clay dike around the course club house. The dike seemed a bit low to me, topping off at about 43 feet. The clay face in the picture will connect with the dike running to the Hesco's above. At the other end, the dike will run southeast into Treefoil Park.

 New to the arsenal this year is the Trap Bag. This is the river side of the structure at the intersection of 12th Ave North and Elm Street (Jack Williams Field).

This is the "dry side" of the structure. "Spirit of Fargo" is a flood recovery fund. The street here is at about 40 feet river gage. There were no barriers here in 1997 and Hescos in 2009

And here is the flood as of about 5:30 PM on  Elm Street looking north. The road was not plowed since it is closed and a little bit of water can be seen crossing it. The river is about twice as wide as normal here and it is about 1.8 feet above flood stage with another 20 feet or so to go. The land on the left is North Dakota and that on the right is Minnesota. In light of the floods since I moved to Fargo, it seems almost unbelievable that in 50% of spring crests" on record, the water never got higher than this.