We had been forewarned that there would be high winds, and the power ALWAYS goes out when we have strong winds. I woke up at 4:45 when Dan got up to shower for work. I turned on the news to see what was up, and already things weren’t looking good. I really wanted Dan to stay home but he swore he needed to go in to work. He had originally planned to stay until around noon then come home, but when I told him that’s when the peak winds were supposed to hit, he decided to just stay a few hours.
Even before he made it to work, I saw on the news that all the routes, except the one we use all the time, were closed due to flooding or other reasons. I called him and begged him to come right home. He did a few things quickly at work then headed home.
When he got back to the junction of the freeway and the highway to Vernonia, he could already see the beginnings of flooding. There’s a large area of flatland right there, and it was already completely underwater. The road had several spots of standing water that was beginning to get deep.
I was so relieved when he made it home around 9. We had the news on, and the boys and I were happily doing school when the phone rang. It was Paul from our church, asking if we could go down and help people take all the stuff out of the downstairs of our church, where they hold Sunday school. We drove down there. One the route there, we had to drive by the “creek” in town, which by then was a raging river. A family had recently built a house near the banks, on a large basement foundation with a garage. By then, the water was half way up the garage door. The creek had jumped the banks in other places too, and was about 1 block into the street. It was 2 blocks from the church at this time. We started bringing stuff up as fast as possible. There were about a dozen people there. The water was coming up from the toilets and starting to flood the floor. It smelled like raw sewage and we did as much as we could and left.
As we were leaving I was talking to my friend who lived about 3 blocks from the church. She said we could come over and hang out at her house, but I don’t think she had any idea of the danger. There is another creek about 3 blocks on the other side of her house too. I gave her my number and directions to my house just in case. When I got home I started calling my friends to make sure they were OK, especially my friend who lives right by the lake and has a newborn. They had made it to another friends house to stay.
Kimmy, my friend, calls and says she’s getting worried, she can see the water. She needs to get out immediately. She was moving stuff upstairs, then was going to come over, but was scared she wouldn’t make it through the standing water on the road. Dan went down there in our truck and led her through the mess because she wanted to make sure she got her car out. They got out JUST in time. The puddle she had to drive through was so high the water was up to the wheel wells.
We hung out at home, watching TV while the rain poured down. The wind was not nearly what the predicted in our area, but the water just wouldn’t stop. Just as the rain seemed to stop, the power and phones went completely out.
We have a generator, so we fired that up and watched the news. It was just incredible. Streets all over Portland were closed because of standing water. Kimmy and I decided to take a walk to see what was going on in town. We walked down to my neighbor’s house where there is a trail that takes you down to a street closer to where the water is. We could see the water raging and when we got to the main road the water was at least 3 blocks long. A lifted jeep went through it and was all the way up to it’s headlights.
Kimmy had left her big dogs upstairs at her house, and when she saw the water she was going to walk through it. I talked her into going back to my house, where Dan could blow up our inflatable boat and take her down that way. It took about ½ hour to get the boat ready, and they took off about 4:30 just as it was getting dark.
They ended up boating about 8 blocks to her house. She pushed open her gate and they floated right up to her front door. There was about 2 feet of standing water inside at the time. They got the dogs, then boated around her house to where their boat was stored. Her cat was hiding there so they grabbed her and came home.
Her husband Raymond had gone into work that day, and we had called him to tell him not even to try to come home. He of course didn’t listen to us, and tried to get home. The only communication we had at that time was cell phones, and he didn’t have one. We waited and waited for a call and it never came. Kimmy was calling everyone she knew to try to find him with no luck.
We finally went to bed around 10 or so. At 4 AM Hennessy woke up because it was dark and she was scared. We all sat up. When the boys got up Dan started the generator again so we could watch the news. At about 6:00 a white truck drove up to our house and we knew Raymond had made it home safe.
He had waited at each place of standing water all night until it receded enough for his truck to make it through. He made it close to town at about 1 am and left his truck because there was 1 area he couldn’t cross. The Corps of Engineers picked him up in their huge truck and took him to the mini mart, about 3 blocks from his house. He then ended up wading through chest deep water to their house where he stayed until morning.
We went down to their house that morning to survey the damage. All her new furniture (not totally paid for) was ruined, the carpets, bottom kitchen cabinets, everything. She’s a dog groomer and her shop was flooded too.
Cleanup efforts are now underway all over town. The water that covered town was sewage so it’s really gross and smelly. Our days are spent pulling up carpets, sucking water from underneath foundations, and ripping out sopping wet insulation. There is a lot to do to make their house livable again, and they don’t have flood insurance. We wait for the President to step in to get FEMA involved. I hope for their sakes they get what they need.
They are staying with us at the present and will continue to do so until their house is habitable. We’re all learning to live in a house with 8 people (they have a 2 year old), 4 dogs, and 5 cats. It’s interesting to say the least.
