Floods

Monday May 7, 2007
Today it looked like more rain so I hurried and put on my soggy shoes and went into town as I had several errands to run. I left my computer at a friend’s house and then headed off to meet somebody I needed to see. When I got to that part of town there were police everywhere, traffic was crawling, and lots of people were standing out on the road. I wondered if there had been another bombing! When I got to the office I asked what had happened and they said that the neighborhood between there and the river were flooding. As I crossed the bridge on the way to the next stop I was apalled at how huge the river had become. I have never seen it that full. It was near the top of the concrete retaining walls that were built a few years ago. Apparently the tide was coming in at the same time the river was carrying all that water from the previous days’ rain. Downstream from the bridge towards the sea there were giant waves like you’d see in the sea. Police were on the bridge waving traffic on and telling people not to stop. The sidewalks were full of gawkers. The little mosque on the river’s edge on the other side was just about to flood. When I crossed back again a couple of hours later, about noon, there was water filling the street just before the bridge, you had to pass through it to get to the bridge. The concrete retaining walls were only a few inches above the water and were breaking in several places, you could see water pouring over the broken places.

Later I heard that my friend’s house - which had never flooded before - was thigh deep in water. The water had started coming up about 6:30 in the morning as she was getting the kids off to school and getting herself ready to go off to teach. She texted her brother to come to town and help, so he went to town with his car. He had to park it on the main road but they were able to wade out and load up some things to take to a niece’s house. Other things they stuck up above the ceiling. He said there were other houses flooded much deeper. He saw all kinds of debris being carried along including motorcycles, refrigerators, and even a wardrobe tumbling along in the current. The police tied 3 ropes across a place with a particularly strong current so that any people being carried away could grab the rope, if they missed it there was a second and a third rope they could try for. Meanwhile police were on standby with a boat and rubber inner tubes to help rescue people. (I was impressed to hear that they actually were doing something useful for a change!) People were saying what a good thing it happened in the daytime and not at night. And also a mercy that the sky cleared up and it didn’t rain anymore.

Unfortunately my friend put her cellphone in her pocket and then forgot about it as she was in and out of waist deep water salvaging their things. So the cellphone is now ruined.

The nearby Salvation Army office was putting up a tent and getting organized to cook rice and noodles for lunch for flood victims. Some of their staff were busy helping people rescue their things, or accompanying any injured to the nearby hospital. They expect the water to be high for a couple of days and then there will be a huge mess to clean up. One lady I talked to said rather heartlessly that it wasn’t really a humanitarian crisis, that those people shouldn’t have built their houses so close to the river. Maybe so, but on the other hand this IS the worst flood ever. Many of those places have never flooded before. I suppose all the chopping down of forest up stream also contributed significantly.