It looks like things are pretty bad. When I said it shouldn’t be another Stockton, I meant that they weren’t unprepared. It must have kept raining hard for a long time after I went to bed. It sounds like it’s pretty bad down there.
When Stockton got hit the time I lived down there in the early 1990’s, it was an extremely isolated storm that dumped 8 inches of rain in a half to an hour. The rain over that water shed/valley moved unbelievably fast to the bottom of the valley to collect around Stockton and caught the people with out warning. A friend that lived there told me that he didn’t even realize the water had surround the house till he hung up the phone and looking out the window saw one of those house propane tanks float by.
I really hope there was extra time this time and people were able to get to safety, but we’ll see. Lessons learned seem to be too quickly forgotten.
I would have hoped the powers in charge were more prepared last night. The two fatalities that I’ve heard about, if correct, were a couple that hit a wash out on 14, which at that point is a steep down grade. If my memory serves me right,the pictures they were showing on TV looked like the road between Lewiston and what I think was called the arches, an old stone arch bridge on the DM&E line.
I use to work with the Winona Amatuer Radio Club and SkyWarn and unless things have really changed down there, which I’d bet against, they were out enduring the weather all night to help protect the public by reporting water levels. They’re a very dedicated group of amateur radio operators.
WarrenMN aka KA0KXI
