The Red River used to be a place of summertime fun for Jordan Kloster, 11, of Grand Forks, North Dakota. The current was too strong for swimming, but Jordan and his buddies would bike down to the river to go fishing or goof around in canoes. The river seemed like another one of his friends.
But this spring the Red River turned into a nasty enemy, rising up in the worst flood to hit the area in hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of years. Cold brown water has swallowed up businesses, schools and homes, leaving thousands stunned and homeless.
"We didn't think the flood would be so big," says Jordan, staying with his grandparents nearby. "I don't know what's happened to all my friends."
A Furious Flood
Mother Nature dumped a record 116 inches of snow on the area this winter. The shallow river started rising in March, when that snow began melting. The water spread rapidly over the flat region.
For weeks, folks did their best to hold back rising waters by building wall-like dikes and piling up sandbags. But sandbags sank in the muddy ground. The river spilled over dikes and lawns and through houses, until it finally crested last Monday at more than 54 feet. Flooding begins at 28 feet. The highest the river had ever been was 48.8 feet in 1979.
By studying water levels from year to year, scientists estimate how often a certain type of flood might happen. They call this Red River rise a "500-year" flood.
"That doesn't mean something like this comes along every 500 years," says North Dakota flood expert Gregg Wiche. But, he adds, "this is a very rare event."
Coping With Disaster
More than water turned Grand Forks into a ghost town. Fire broke out on April 19, destroying 10 buildings before fire fighters could wade through waters to fight the blaze.
Last week a bad smell of ashes and sewage hung over the charred buildings and swamped homes. The plant that cleans the town's water was flooded, so chemicals and bacteria spread everywhere. The hospital was evacuated, and most schools in the area are closed until next year.
Boats replaced cars as the best way to take people to safety. Hundreds of families that fled their homes found shelter at the Grand Forks Air Force Base. Others moved in with relatives. Total strangers took in stranded victims. Everyone waited, worried about what they had left behind, such as pets and irreplaceable valuables.
"I just hope my old photos have been spared," said Jordan's mother Sylvia. "So much else will be lost."
Among the lost treasures are many farms whose plentiful fields were washed into a watery waste. "The only way I could describe this is as Mother Nature flushing the toilet," said Michael Decorsey, a National Guardsman who helped out in East Grand Forks, Minnesota. "You want to cry, but there's too much to do."
President Clinton visited the flooded plains last week. He promised half a billion dollars in aid and praised the community's team spirit. "No matter what you have lost in this terrible flood, what you have saved and strengthened is infinitely better," Clinton said at the Air Force base.
As the flood surged north last week, Canadians braced for the worst. Thousands left their homes in Manitoba's Red River Valley.
Will life ever return to normal for the flood victims? The huge mess may take years to mop up. But as the river slowly began to recede, hope was rising in its place. Said Grand Forks Mayor Pat Owens: "We will rebuild, and we will be stronger, and we will be in it together."