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How much does a flash flood weigh?Creativity, Calculations, & Some Possibly Disconnected Comments
It's been raining since Wednesday. After a brief respite on Saturday, it's raining again. That's five days out of six (and it rained on Saturday, too, just not all day and night) in an area known for sunshine (330 sunny days per year! boast our tourism and real estate brochures).
The National Weather Service described our flash flooding as "Biblical." A friend from Minnesota asked via email this morning, "...something like 19,000 homes either damaged or destroyed? How can we wrap our minds around that level of destruction?" The same friend mentioned a blog post that claimed the floods had destroyed 45,000 square miles, almost half the state's total area (as near as I can tell, that particular damage report is not accurate).
As I've watched the weather, semi-compulsively checking Facebook and news reports, I've been thinking about how we describe and explain the events and circumstances of our lives--how we use language to convey the important messages of our stories, and how the form and structure of what we say and write affects meaning and understanding.
The rain has fallen steadily. There's been little wind, at least here on the high flat, just east of the first ridged line of hogbacks. It doesn't feel Biblical or torrential; it just feels wet, soggy, and gray. It reminds me of Ohio, where I grew up and where (in my memory at least) long soaker rains weren't unusual.
Cache la Poudre River is on the other side of town. Big Thompson River is south and far away from me (but not from friend and colleague John Luzader and his wife Lynda, who have been evacuated to safety, last I heard). Sitting in my kitchen sipping tea, watching the tent gazebo sag under the weight of water that refuses to drain out the rivet holes the way it's supposed to, it's easy to think that this is just rain, gentle rain that nourishes my parched yard.
But rain, even gentle rain, is a powerful force. A friend at the grocery store yesterday said that she stood outside as the rain began on Wednesday and knew it would be bad because "it felt exactly like that rain in 1997," when rains brought the Spring Creek flood. Locals don't just remember that flash flood; we feel it. We point out the site where the trailer park was, recall how people climbed out of their trailers and into the trees, and shake our heads at the rezoning that green-lighted a new apartment complex (nearly finished) on the same patch of ground.
That something as soft and life-giving as water can be incredibly destructive is a story we have to tell ourselves over and over again. We never quite believe it. "Natural disasters" are by definition out of the ordinary events. A hurricane off the Gulf--sure, those we know about, we see their horrifying power. But this rain? A friend who lives up-canyon, on land scarred by last summer's High Park fire, said, "If this land were flat, they'd call this storm, 'Hurricane Katrina.'" Photos on Facebook show trees bent low, awash in rain. For a long time, my brain refuses to believe that these trees are near Denver, not New Orleans.
The burn scars are doubly dangerous. The trees are gone, the toes of their roots no longer gripping the soil. But trees alone aren't the only reason the soil is sliding off the mountainside. Decades of fallen pine needles and dry detritus burned away, too. That ground cover acted like a sponge, holding the water, releasing it slowly into the underlying earth. No sponge, nothing to hold the water back.
Numbers are a big part of this story, too. Amy Ford, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Transportation said that the actual number of roads damaged or destroyed is unknown, but sections of three U.S. highways and various mountain roads are heavily damaged. Thirty highway bridges have been destroyed, 20 are seriously damaged, and transportation officials suspect another 20 are damaged. According to Boulder resident Rudy Harburg, Boulder's Home Depot sold 700 sump pumps in four hours. Micki Trost, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, reports that about 14,500 people have been evacuated from flooded areas in 15 counties, and that 1,329 stayed overnight Saturday in 26 emergency shelters. The Cache la Poudre river reached 14.56 feet (nearly seven times its average during the previous four days) at 8:15 a.m. Friday. At that peak, more than 420,000 gallons of water passed a stream gauge every second.
To be perfectly honest, none of these numbers makes much sense to me. How can we wrap our brains around 19,000 homes, 14,500 evacuees, 700 sump pumps? My brain struggles to translate thousands of gallons into anything meaningful.
But I don't have to, because an interpretive writer I've never met, whose name I've never discovered, found a way to help me understand how powerful the water is, how something so soft and gentle as this rain can eradicate everything I take for granted, everything that most days I believe is permanent. This simple sign (a printout held by magnets to a sheltered board) was outside a closed information center at Grand Staircase Escalante-National Monument. It's still one of my all-time favorite interpretive signs. (And if you're the writer who created it, let me know!)
 | | (If you can't read the text, see below) |
The sun is finally breaking through the clouds. Longs Peak peers over the shoulders of closer neighbors. The adage "clear sailing ahead" comes to mind, but I decide to ignore it; it might be too literal for today's forecast.
JudyThe text on the sign reads:How Much Does A Flash Flood Weigh?(left column)Volume1 ac-ft. = 325,851.43 gallons 1 gallon = 8.345 lbs 1 ac-ft. = 2,437,528.4 lbs Largest Elephant = 24,000 lbs 1 ac-ft. = 113 Large Elephants(right column)Flow 1 cu ft. = 7.4805 gallons 1 cu ft. = 62.42 lbs 1000 cu ft./sec = 62,420 lbs/sec 1000 cfs = 2.6 Large Elephants rolling by each secondSo DO NOT Get Caught In A Flash Flood!
Comments? Questions?
970/416-6353 888/886-9289 email Judy
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How to Create Stories that
Make a Difference
September 20-21, 2013
Squam Lakes Natural Science Center
Holderness, NH
Have a last-minute opening in your schedule for this Friday and Saturday? Join us for a 2-day interp writing workshop at Squam Lakes Natural Science Center in Holderness, New Hampshire (an hour's drive from Manchester, NH, about 2 hours from Boston, MA).
This will be a small, tightly focused workshop, with lots of hands-on practice. It's in a beautiful location, with comfortable and affordable lodging nearby. Workshop fee is $395 and includes two-day workshop, all workshop materials, and workbook. TO REGISTER, CALL 603/968-7194.
Please note that Squam Lakes Natural Science Center is handling all registration for this workshop.
To register, simply call 603/968-7194.
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