Fargo residents hold on as storm puts sandbags to the test

By Kaylee King
Chicago Tribune

(MCT)

FARGO, N.D. _ Flood-weary homeowners watched Monday as the water line inched down the trunks of sunken trees, sparking the hope that the worst of the damage by the rising and marauding Red River was over. But we weren't out of the woods yet.

We spent the weekend filling and stacking sandbags, and people were starting to breathe a sigh of relief as the river levels began rapidly dropping throughout Sunday and Monday.

But with the positive, there also came a negative: a winter storm warning. Local weathermen wearily reported the area would be blasted with 12 inches of snow. Meaning, the Red River could jump back as high as 41 feet, increasing pressure on already exhausted homeowners and sandbag dikes.

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Nicholas Shannon, a friend of mine whose parent's home usually welcomes the beautiful flowing river in their backyard, flew back from a spring break trip to help in the battle against the Red.

"I felt bad, because when I got here all the hard labor work was done," Shannon said. "It's OK though, now my dad and I stay up all night watching the pumps and spending good time together."

Shannon lives in St. Paul, Minn., and attends St. Thomas University. He will take the week off of school to stay home and help his dad while his mom is out of town.

Folks like Shannon are sprinkled throughout Fargo and are easy to pick out. They have dark bags under their eyes and glassy stares from the fight against the icy water that threatens their homes.

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It was late last Wednesday when I got the call that solidified my decision to head home to help in the fight to save Fargo from flooding disaster. Nervously, my dad explained on the phone the flood of 2009 was an entirely different ballgame from the flood of 1997, and the crest could reach anywhere from 42 to 43 feet.

To most, those crest numbers mean nothing, but to the residents of Fargo, a few precious feet equal the gap between staying dry and losing a home to the muddy, murky depths of the Red.

This weekend was spent throwing hundreds of sandbags, checking multiple pumps and hearing story upon story of the flood experiences of neighbors. More than 75 close family friends were issued mandatory or voluntary evacuation notices _ often coming in the middle of the night from city officials or National Guard members. Five more family friends' sandbag dikes surrendered to the pressure of the river as water rushed into the basements and lower levels of properties, destroying everything in its path.

The skies above Fargo are consistently humming as massive Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters and U.S. Coast Guard choppers circle the area using infrared cameras to survey the dikes in search of the slightest leak, or worse, a total breach.

Non-essential businesses are closed, except hardware stores, which have extended their hours _ some to 24 hours _ in order to give the people of Fargo any possible resource to stock up on generators, pumps, rubber boots and other flood essentials.

The city has suggested no travel on the main arteries of the city, making it extremely difficult to get around. National Guard men and women sit at almost every intersection directing traffic, building clay dikes and helping in emergency dike breaches.

Residents in high-risk areas are on constant high alert, staying up every waking hour to make sure their pumps don't freeze or dikes become weak. But, unfortunately some fall asleep and disaster strikes.

Dennis Walaker, the mayor, revealed in the morning flood meeting that federal officials nudged him to evacuate the entire city, but he resisted. If the people of Fargo were not here to fight the water, the city would have been lost _ no question.

But surprisingly, the energy in Fargo is of positive nature. While sandbagging this weekend, jokes flew and people laughed at the bizarre nature of the entire situation. Hundreds of thousands of gallons of water lay bound behind a leaking clay dike a mere 150 feet away as we bagged a backup dike to protect the neighboring development. But worrying about the leak was not going to bring people down. Their attitude was simply "We are here, and we're going to have a good time battling this."

Behind the smiles and kind eyes, though, the people in Fargo know the state of affairs is precarious. Residents have seen floods before, obviously nothing like this record-shattering flood, but rising water is nothing new.

All they can do now is wait. The next battle is the major winter storm that threatens the integrity of not only the dikes, but could cause ice jams in the Red.

Come hell or high water, the people in Fargo won't let the city go down.

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© 2009, Chicago Tribune.

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