That's the Kickapoo River as it flow through Gays Mills, Wisconsin.
Photographed during apple blossom time.
Today, this news:
For nearly a year, this tiny southwestern Wisconsin village has struggled to survive after a devastating flood. New rising waters may have sealed its fate.Very sad for the beautiful little town nestled in the river valley.
Flash floods inundated the town of 625 over the weekend, just 10 months after residents worked to rebuild their homes and businesses.
The swollen Kickapoo River spilled over its banks again and engulfed nearly the entire town Monday morning, forcing about 150 people to evacuate. By evening, the village was reduced to a grid of canals with cars submerged up to their windows and parking lots looking like lakes, just as it was in August....
[R]esidents stood on the edge of their ruined town, so close to finally turning the corner before this latest flood.
"I can't believe this is happening again," said Liz Klekamp, 23....
AND: Elsewhere in Wisconsin: "The lake is gone." The 267-acre Lake Delton drained:
The dam itself held, but a section of shoreline did not, washing out Highway A and creating a 400- to 500-foot wide outlet to the Wisconsin River, 700 feet away. A swirling chocolate malt of angry liquid escaped through the gap, spreading into the marsh and carrying houses, trees and an upside-down pontoon boat with it.
A swirling chocolate malt of angry liquid...
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24 comments:
Well, Soldiers Grove moved to escape Kickapoo flooding. Maybe Gays Mills should too, although you can't have a Mill if you're not near a river power source.
The emptying of Lake Delton is surely the bigger news though. Crazy!
ot: Almost at 14 M hits!
Flash floods inundated the town of 625 over the weekend, just 10 months after residents worked to rebuild their homes and businesses
and
"I can't believe this is happening again," said Liz Klekamp
Oh please. Spare me.
Can we get someone to explain to these people the idiocy of building a town in a flood plain?
How much of our tax dollars have gone into the pockets of these parasitic morons?
Paul -- probably not as many as have gone into New Orleans.
At least, with Gays Mills, I would agree, but not Lake Delton. Those folks were told they weren't in a floodplain - and they have no choice, but to move - their land is somewhere down river.
My parents were at their cottage in Lake Delton and they had to go to the basement during the storm.
They told me that peoples piers were floating all over the lake and that there were pontoon boats floating in the lake.
Very sad.
How much of our tax dollars have gone into the pockets of these parasitic morons?
The two floods in WI have both been once in 200-500 year events. As a result, Madison, for example, has had more rain in the past twelve months than in any calendar year going back to 1869.
But if it makes you feel any better Paul, Wisconsin is a net giver to the US Treasury, getting about the same per capita as Texas -- 90 cents for every dollar given. So any money thrown this way by the Federal Govt is deserved, IMO, to balance things out.
As a result, Madison, for example, has had more rain in the past twelve months than in any calendar year going back to 1869.
No wonder my roof leaks (I think I fixed it (knock on wood); nothing came in on Sunday).
Does this record include the snowfall from this last winter?
Yes. Well, the liquid content of the snow after it's melted.
Is this good for Madison's water supply or does it not matter?
There is terrible flooding in Iowa as well.
My wife and daughter drove through some awful storms on their way south, but couldn't drive past Waterloo as all roads had just been closed.
They saw farmhouses surrounded by water, streams cresting over bridges, and dead cows floating in the fields. Scary sights, all.
Mason City IA has no water supply because the sewers are all full and backed up.
@ paul a'barge: Every city, town and village in the world located near a body of water has the potential for flooding. Shall we move damned near every population center in the country to higher land?
Let's see how well Lake Bastrop would hold up if it had to withstand over a year of historic rainy weather.
"A swirling chocolate malt of angry liquid..."
That makes me horny. I am thinking of the Boston/LA NBA finals agains.
Kolbe give me your swirling chocolate malt of angry liquid.
@ paul a'barge: Every city, town and village in the world located near a body of water has the potential for flooding. Shall we move damned near every population center in the country to higher land?
No, but neither should we subsidize the natural disasters that occur when you knowingly and purposely live in a flood zone, on top of an earthquake fault, on the edge of sandy cliff overlooking the ocean, in a city below sea level, in the middle of historical tornado paths, on the edge of the beach where hurricanes have landed for millions of years, and so on.
"You takes your chances." Don't want to have your house flooded? Don't build in a flood plain. Rivers have been the channel for commerce for millenium and rivers have flooded periodically and even changed their directions.
Life is full of risk and sometimes it doesn't work out so well.
I agree with most of your list, DBQ, but I feel compelled to point out there is no such thing as a "historical tornado path".
And Jesus the Claims Adjuster sayeth unto you:
Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock.
But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.
The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash."
That is, this loss is not covered under the current policy. You need the Come Hell or High Water codicil.
"I agree with most of your list, DBQ, but I feel compelled to point out there is no such thing as a "historical tornado path".
Ok....historical tornado corridor then. :-)
[waving from atop the San Andreas fault]
Sitting between two volcanoes and on the edge of a cliff above a river.
/wave
I did buy earthquake insurance, but not much coverage for lava or pumice.
Southern Indiana is getting hit real hard with storms as well. From Indianapolis south to Columbus seems to be the worse. I drove up I65 yesterday from Nashville to Chicago and fields that were corn last year are lakes this year. 65 was closed for a bit on Sunday as it flooded.
Ok....historical tornado corridor then. :-)
That would be the entire Midwest and Great Plains. (Really. I'm not trying to be argumentative.)
Actually, if we exclude trailer parks, the risk is rather small.
Actually, if we exclude trailer parks, the risk is rather small.
I believe the proper term for trailer parks is tornado farms.
Well, yeah, and in the SE you got hurricanes, and in the west you got earthquakes and volcanoes.
And, let's face it, the entire northeast and most of the north of the country is so brutally cold, blizzards routinely kill more than all the other kinds of disasters combined. (I think that's true, if you factor in all the various winter-related causes.)
Living is dangerous. Nobody gets out alive.
Heat waves kill far more people than cold outbreaks. Especially heat waves that last for more than, say, 4 days.
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