In addition for smaller streams, urban and small stream flood advisories and areal flood warnings were issued by both NWS Seattle and Portland forecast offices. Flooding of the Long Tom River closed the bridge in Monroe and covered Zeller's driveway. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration • Eleven counties were declared federal disaster areas. The couple remained in their home, living on the second floor, although they did not have electricity. “We just weren’t as prepared then as we are today. The strong westerly winds aloft enhanced precipitation amounts in the mountains. It was the oddest feeling. A man prepares to cross over sandbags protecting the Greenberry Store and Tavern south of Corvallis. He recalled commenting to a city official that “if they couldn’t get the water down, they might as well stock it with fish.”. Robin Anderson carries her cat, Simon, through the knee-deep water that flooded her house in North Albany. The Willamette River crested at 28.5 feet in downtown Portland, 10 feet above flood level. “But when warm rains came in from the Pacific, that snow melted and the ice prevented it from being absorbed into the ground, which might normally occur.”. The storms were the result of a gradual transition from the influence of the northerly storm track to a westerly storm track, which was originating in the subtropics north of Hawaii. This storm was a classic example of a nor'easter, but the storm would not have been as historically significant without the presence of the arctic high pressure system located to the north of New York. Archive video: 1996 floods in Oregon, Southwest Washington. Neal Karo has been a volunteer firefighter in Brownsville for more than 60 years and was headed to work the morning floodwaters rose in the community. In early 1996 flooding led to several deaths, property damage and the destruction of … On Feb. 9, 1996, the river crested at 27.2 feet, more than 11 feet above its flood stage. “It is in times like that people really come together. Former Linn County Commissioner Will Tucker and his family were living near Lacomb when the storm hit. Enjoy unlimited articles at one of our lowest prices ever. A series of three storms moved through the Pacific Northwest from Saturday, December 1st, through Monday, December 3, 2007. It will likely exceed that in many specific locations. Your membership makes our reporting possible. In the months prior to February, record snowfall had been accumulating, saturating the soil. This flood event spurred a move to build more dams and renewed a focus on flood control. “It was a shock,” Kim said. Peaks reached nearly 35 feet at Umatilla, Oregon, and Longview, Washington hit a record 24.0 feet (12 feet over flood stage). Andrea Hopkins leads her horse, Jeza Tzar, through high water along 15th Avenue in Philomath while family friend John Mergl helps carry items out of the flood zone. More than 50 volunteers — many of them members of the Alpha Gammo Rho agricultural fraternity — packed more than 5,000 sandbags to keep water out of the buildings at Stahlbush Island Farms, just across the flood-swollen Willamette River from downtown Corvallis. Hiner said the American Red Cross provided the family with a voucher and they were able to stay in a motel for almost a week. As big as this flood event was, even setting records at some gages, the USGS estimated that the only stream gage that reached its 1% chance annual flood (a.k.a. Stampede Pass in the central Washington Cascades received an all-time daily record rain total of 8.22 inches on Nov 6, breaking the old record of 7.29 inches set on Nov 19, 1962. A downed tree or mudslide had closed the highway, and for a few hours Burright and David were unable to leave Mehama. Tucker said she called him and he drove into town in his pickup, but on the way home, high water on Kowitz Road almost swept the truck into the ditch. the "100 year flood") was the the Palouse River at Potlatch. They came from California and Randall was working with Hewlett-Packard, writing procedures for Federal-Metals Credit Union (now Central Willamette Credit Union). Water was pouring down the stairwell into the Police Department.”. NWS Seattle (41), NWS Portland (6), NWS Spokane (1) and NWS Pendleton (4) issued flood warnings for 52 flood warning points throughout the state during the event. “I was brand new at reporting, and I was struggling trying to figure out a meaningful way to let the public know about this major event,” Ware said. The Pineapple Express, the weather pattern responsible for the '96 flood, is something that happens regularly over time. In just13 days, the hot lava melted some 3 cubic km (0.73 cubic miles) of ice.5 As the ice melted, the water drained rapidly along a narrow channelunder the glacier into Lake Grímsvötn. Hiner said the family was notified the night before the floodwaters arrived. The flow at the Methow River, which surpassed its flood stage level of 10 feet, and rose to 12.30. The flood was a life-changing event for Salina Hart, who was an Estacada High School senior in February 1996. Like many others across the state, owners Bill and Karla Chambers were caught off guard by the swiftly rising water. River waters, with nowhere else to go, swelled higher than anyone had seen in at least half a century. In early February 1996, a weeklong freeze followed by a Pineapple Express storm saturated Western Oregon and led to massive flooding. “The next day, the water was already up to the BP station on Highway 20,” Hiner said. The best news was that their rare 1958 Messerschmitt roadster — one of only 21 known to be in the USA — was not damaged, because they had hoisted the small car onto a table.
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