Flood photos — January 2012

Here are some photos from the recent Willamette River flood here on Grand Island — all of these were taken on Saturday, January 21, during the approximate crest (29.36 ft at Salem, the 14th biggest flood in recorded history). Hopefully this is the end of excitement for this winter!

When we woke up to the excitement of the crest on Saturday morning, Rusty's first inclination was to run outside and start throwing rocks in this massive river running through our property.

The woven wire fence running along my parents' property to our north was completely submerged on Saturday, as was their lower field that we farm — that big lake is the field!

Our field greenhouses were also under water, along with most of the trees in our orchards (you can see the tops of the young trees poking up through the water). Fortunately there wasn't much growing in the houses, and we intentionally oriented them with the water's flow, so it seems there won't be any damage there.

This is looking south across the home farm from our house. You can see the river running along the trees to the left and the two fingers of water crossing the field. Fortunately, the winter veggies were spared, and our chickens and ducks were on high enough ground too! Just barely though! Woah!

Looking back at our house from the fields (our house is the brown one in the center). We are so grateful for this little piece of high ground! We're not sure whether or not we enjoyed our temporary waterfront status though.

This was taken on Friday afternoon, before the crest. This is looking east at the road that connects from "four corners" to the middle of the island and is our access when we want to visit our new land. The river started pouring over this road pretty early on in the flood, making it completely inaccessible. The warning is serious (and worked! There were many gawkers driving around big trucks on the island during the flood, but none of them risked their lives on this road!).

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