What a difference a year can make

By Nancy Emerson

Just one year ago (51 weeks to be more precise), the people of the Red River Valley were on a roller coaster ride.

On the Friday before the record crest of the flooding Red River, many in our community had traveled to Minneapolis to cheer on North Dakota State University as the men's basketball team played in its first-ever Division I NCAA Tournament game. The next day, following a disappointing loss, people from the community were once again side by side, only this time the competition was rapidly rising flood water.

We knew we were in for a major flood in 2009, but the predictions kept changing, sometimes by the day and sometimes, seemingly, by the hour. The river in Fargo-Moorhead finally crested at a record level just under 41 feet. While the breaches to levees and dikes were minimal, the experience left an exhausted community in its wake.

As a colleague reminded me in the weeks that followed, we needn't have sustained damage to large numbers of homes and businesses to have suffered trauma. Yes, the flood of 2009 was traumatic to this community in many ways. The hospitals closed to all but emergency cases. Residents of nursing homes were evacuated as far as 300 miles. In Moorhead, entire neighborhoods in the eight blocks nearest the river were asked to voluntarily evacuate.

Sewer systems were compromised. Lift stations failed. Some dikes were breached. Many families' homes were in fact flooded when sump pumps were unable to keep up with the incoming waters. The National Guard posted soldiers on the corner of the street where our church sits. It's the only time I've ever had to ask permission to enter the neighborhood of the church I serve. It's also the first time I ever experienced a flizzard (that's when a blizzard and a flood converge).

Yet the flood of 2009 is not remembered most for its trauma. The flood of 2009 in Fargo-Moorhead is remembered for the people's heroic actions. Tens of thousands of volunteers helped to fill and lay down 6 million or so sandbags. Schools -- including secondary schools, colleges, universities, and technical institutes -- canceled classes in favor of sandbagging. People poured in from outstate, from out of state, and in a case or two from across the country to lend a helping hand to "neighbors" in need. We in the Fargo-Moorhead area are grateful they did. They helped us to save our cities from catastrophe. In case we haven't said so before, we thank you all.

Fast forward 51 weeks, to 2010. As I write, the river is three days from its predicted crest of approximately 38 feet. While nearly 3 feet lower than last year, this will be among the top five floods on record. Our anxiety has been accelerating as we have once again prepared to ride the roller coaster. But for most of us, this ride seems more like a carousel than the Wild Thing.

As one of my congregation members whose in-laws live on the front lines of the flood said to me, "This is a piece of cake compared to last year." His 90-year-old mother-in-law was in the house, reading the newspaper. "This is becoming old hand," she said to me. It is after all the third major flood in just five years.

Rivershore Drive was eerily quiet this afternoon. Last year seemed chaotic just days before the crest. Then, the streets were lined with cars, volunteers and piles of sand. For nearly a week straight, communities worked from sunrise until sunset, wondering whether they could build dikes tall enough and strong enough for the ever-rising flood predictions. Today there were a handful of volunteers placing the final sandbags on the top of a much shorter dike.

The volunteers were out in droves Tuesday, and much of the labor was accomplished once again by youth and young adults. Tonight the sandbagging stations sit empty as 1.3 million sandbags have been delivered throughout Fargo-Moorhead. For the time being, additional reserves are not required, and Fargo's mechanical sandbag spiders sit idle. Thanks to resiliency of spirit, help from neighbors and Mother Nature, and thanks to lessons learned in 2009, the communities of Fargo-Moorhead are prepared for this particular flood.

And if we ride out this year's flood with minimal damage, we will have had thrill enough.

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Nancy Emerson is pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Moorhead, Minn.

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