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Up until the end of last year I lived uphill from a quiet little stream known as the Meramec River.
You may have heard about it recently.
It was a 1/2 mile walk from my back door to the river. Admittedly most of that walk was close to vertically downhill, and that for my old home to flood, well, we'd all be looking to make friends with whoever was in charge of the Ark this time.
That river, that I have walked across some summers without getting my knees wet, has made headline news.
For the second time in 15 years it has reached the popular phrase--The 100 year flood.
During that 15 year interval a prison has gone up in the area they said would never flood again in our life time, the highway was rebuilt, and luckily, Times Beach Missouri, once one of the worst man-made ecological disasters due to waste chemical dumping (dioxin laced oil was used to pave the streets) had all of its top soil incinerated. Those opposes said, "It'll be a hundred years before that place floods again. Just clean it up and worry about it later."
Its underwater as we speak.
The town where I went to school is partially submerged. Friends homes I played in as a child are under water.
I looked at the video and the photos of it and you know what? I got the same gut reaction I always get when I see pictures of floods....bid deal.
So there is a town with the stop sign almost under water. Bid deal.
However, when I drove by those towns, saw the floods for real, well, wow.
Seeing the floods, seeing them on places that you know, puts a whole new feeling to the view. My memory knows that the park was there, the ground rose and fell in such a pattern, that the bridge was scary because it was so high above the water. Looking at the bridge under the water, the dips and hills, parks and trees under the water, but knowing what they were like mere days ago, impresses a person.
The Mighty Meramec crested at 40 feet Saturday. That was 23 feet OVER flood stage. It was over twice as deep normal.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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When driving in Kansas, you'll encounter large, long bridges over seemingly insignificant creeks and rivers. Witness those creeks and rivers at their flood stage, and you begin to understand what you might have initially mistaken for overengineering. Posts: 1813 | Registered: Apr 2001
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A friend from our church was from the small town of Greensburg, Kansas, which was wholly destroyed by tornado last year. He has gone back there several times to help rebuild buildings and lives. It really brought it home for some of us who have never been through that kind of trajedy, or even lived in any place where it was more likely to happen.
Posts: 369 | Registered: Apr 2007
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