Flood damage

I spent a couple of days over the Labor Day weekend in the Winona area. One of the reasons I wanted to go there was to see some of the effects of the recent flooding for myself. Someone said, you can read about the flood, and look at pictures in the paper, but seeing it yourself in person is quite a different experience. I quite agree. I drove from Lewiston through Stockton to Winona. One could see erosion along the sides of the roadway -- watch for fallen rock, indeed -- but the effects in town were more pronounced. Every household in Stockton (and I just drove through on highway 14) had a pile of trash at the end of the driveway, awaiting pickup. I saw numerous mud-caked, apparently totalled, cars in yards; and houses with much of the land nearby and underneath them washed away, foundations seemingly hanging in space. Later that day, I drove up to Minnesota City, but couldn't get very far as many of the roadways into town were still blocked off.

The next day I drove down to and around in the town of Rushford. The situation there is even worse. I'm told by my friend Stix who lives there that they're not expecting to be able to use their water supply for things like washing and cooking for another couple of weeks. As I drove around town, there were many, many more piles of trashed belongings in piles along the side of the street. Many houses were left wide open, presumably to air out and make it easier to get everything out of them; it was rather disturbing to notice open doors leading to empty rooms. Lots of houses had fluorescent painted symbols on them; some said "OK", others had letters and symbols that I couldn't interpret. I'm sure many of those houses are not now habitable or able to be recouped. The parking lot of the grocery store was filled with its fixtures: shelving and refrigerated units that I assume are no longer usable. There were signs up around town indicating that the local convenience store was open for "drinks and snacks" so I stopped in to buy a can of pop. All of the coolers and shelves from this store were gone as well. There was one metal rack holding bags of chips and a couple of glass fronted, refrigerated coolers stocked with pop. Oh, and scattered on every block were a couple of porta-potties. I was, more than anything, reminded of pictures of New Orleans, post-Katrina. Perhaps on a smaller scale, but the devastation seemed just as complete.

My thoughts and best wishes go out to my friends in the area, and to everyone affected by this tragedy. As signs all around Rushford proudly proclaimed: "Never ever give up."