Saturday morning updates......
http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_24087103/colorado-floods-evacuations-road-closures-create-havoc-fort
Rivers continued to swell, roadways crumbled, and Colorado's Front Range began to dig out from the epic destruction wrought by a historic flood that has become one of the state's worst disasters.
"We're not out of the woods yet," said Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner on Friday morning — a day that saw the skies clear but catastrophe continue.
Rivers raged, highways and local roads shut down, residents remained stranded, power failed, and officials confirmed four people had died: a boyfriend and girlfriend, both 19, in Boulder; a Jamestown man; and a man who drowned in Fountain Creek in Colorado Springs.
Boulder officials Saturday morning said 218 people are still unaccounted for, meaning they had not been in touch with relatives.
The disaster was widespread and affected nearly everyone and everything in a swath of Colorado stretching from Pueblo to the Wyoming border — from schoolkids and college students, whose classes were canceled, to livestock, sports games and even climbers on Longs Peak.
Two women from Maine who were stranded by weather below the 14,259-foot summit called for help, which could not reach them. They waited more than 48 hours before hiking to safety Friday.
The University of Colorado postponed Saturday's football game against Fresno State, only the third time that has happened — the first was when President Kennedy was killed, and the second was after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Residents packed sand into bags Friday afternoon, preparing for the South Platte River to crest in Kersey on Saturday and in Sterling sometime Sunday. On Friday, the river carried 50 times more water than it normally does at this time of year.
"Everyone along the river is worried,"
The Alpine Rescue Team uses a high line and a sling across Fourmile Canyon to rescue Darian Shaw of Salina and three neighbors from 4 Mile Canyon. (Joe Amon, The Denver Post)
Robert Kimbrough, associate director for hydrologic data with the Colorado Water Science Center, estimated the South Platte River near Kersey was running at 23,700 cubic feet per second at 5:30 p.m. Friday — higher than the National Weather Service's predicted crest.
"It has not begun to level off," he said.
Gov. John Hickenlooper declared a disaster emergency in 14 counties, authorizing $6 million to pay for flood response and recovery in Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, El Paso, Fremont, Jefferson, Larimer, Logan, Morgan, Pueblo, Washington and Weld.
Thousands of people remained out of their homes. Many did not know whether they had a home any longer.
Military helicopters rescued nearly 300 people from Jamestown — a town in Boulder County that become an island Wednesday.
The Colorado National Guard drove high-clearance trucks through the water to get people out of Lyons, which was cut off when the St. Vrain River roared into a behemoth Thursday morning, flooding the town and all exit routes.
Michael Twarogowski watched the river crest near his Lyons home around 1 a.m. Thursday. He ushered his family to the car and
Left: Norman Bowers, the fire chief of the Indian Peaks Fire Protection District, gets help from Pat Paxton, far left, to fill up several gallons of gasoline for the station in Gilpin County on Friday. With the town of Nederland out of power, this was the only station with gas between Nederland and Estes Park. Folks were driving from all of the mountain communities to fill their tanks for the long drives ahead.(Helen H. Richardson, The Denver Post)
Thursday morning, Twarogowski watched the landscape of Lyons change — sheds and outbuildings being gobbled up by the river and shattered against trees.
Twarogowski checked on his home one last time before being evacuated Friday. It had been spared.
But not far away, the sight was far more devastating: homes surrounded by water with trees and limbs pushed up against them, a metal footbridge wiped out. Some houses were swept from their foundations.
A few miles west on U.S. 36, more than 100 stranded residents of Pinewood Springs and Big Elk Meadows frantically tried to hire private helicopters to
Above: A Jamestown evacuee is helped off a helicopter at Boulder Municipal Airport. (Andy Cross, The Denver Post)
Larimer County Sheriff Justin Smith said his department has requested one or two more Air National Guard helicopters but needed more.
Military copters also plucked people from Big Thompson Canyon, where Smith said parts of U.S. 34 had been "washed to the bedrock."
Smith flew through the canyon in a Black Hawk helicopter, seeing washed-out roads, splintered buildings and stranded people moving around on the ground assessing the damage.
"I was shocked at the width of the Big Thompson in Loveland, but that doesn't compare to the canyon and 17 miles of roadway gone," he said. "There are still hundreds, if not thousands, of people who can't get out."
Rivers flowing 10 times higher than normal forced new evacuations in Jefferson, Larimer and Weld counties on Friday. In Jeffco, Bear Creek flooded Evergreen's downtown district, and threatened Morrison and Kittredge downstream.
Traffic remained a mess as roads were shut down, washed away or under water — from local roads to major highways including Interstates 25 and 70 and U.S. 85.
Dozens of Jeffco students at the Mount Evans Outdoor Lab had to hike out during a lull in the weather to a passable roadway. And 85 students from Louisville's Fireside Elementary were expected to be helicoptered out of the CalWood Education Center near Jamestown.
and.....
http://www.businessinsider.com/colorado-town-cutoff-by-floodwaters-2013-9
DENVER (Reuters) - More heavy rain is expected on Saturday in Colorado where rescue workers are battling to reach residents cut off by the worst floods in decades, which have killed at least four people and left 172 still unaccounted for.
Search and rescue teams have used boats and helicopters to pull stranded residents to safety in areas where flash floods toppled buildings, washed out roads and inundated farmland.
The flooding began overnight Wednesday. It was triggered by unusually heavy late-summer storms that soaked Colorado's biggest urban centers, from Fort Collins near the Wyomingborder south through Boulder, Denver and Colorado Springs.
Boulder and a string of other towns along the Front Range of the Rockies north of Denver were especially hard hit as water poured down rain-soaked mountains and spilled through canyons that funneled the runoff into populated areas.
Overnight, rescue workers took advantage of a break in the weather to reach residents still stranded in their homes by rampaging floodwaters that turned creeks into raging torrents that burst their banks.
"Quite a bit of the water has receded in the city ... and rescue crews will work throughout the night," Ashlee Herring, a spokeswoman for the Boulder Office of Emergency Management said of the recovery effort.
The National Weather Service in Boulder warned of scattered showers and thunderstorms later on Saturday and into Sunday that could trigger further flash flooding in the already drenched area.
DISASTER
Lyons, a town north of Boulder, was virtually cut off when floodwaters washed out U.S. Route 36, stranding residents without water and power for 48 hours.
At least four people were killed, including a couple swept away in floodwaters after stopping their car northwest of Boulder. The man's body was recovered on Thursday and the woman had been missing and feared dead before her body was found on Friday.
Also killed were a person whose body was found in a collapsed building near Jamestown, an evacuated enclave north of Boulder, and a man in Colorado Springs, about 100 miles to the south, officials said.
On Friday, Governor John Hickenlooper declared a disaster emergency for 14 counties, reaching from the Wyoming border south to Colorado Springs. The declaration authorizes $6 million in funds to pay for flood response and recovery.
In neighboring New Mexico, where floods forced the evacuation of hundreds of people inEddy, Sierra and San Miguel counties, Governor Susana Martinez declared a state of disaster on Friday making funding available to state emergency officials for recovery efforts.
The Boulder Office of Emergency Management listed 172 people as unaccounted for following the floods, stressing that while they were not yet considered missing or in danger, relatives and authorities had not been able to contact them.
In rural Weld County, where the South Platte River has overflowed its banks and virtually cut the county in half, aerial TV footage showed large stretches of land covered in brown water on Friday. Many homes and farms were largely half-submerged.
Weld County sheriff's spokesman Steve Reams said nearly every road in and around a cluster of towns that includes Greeley, Evans and Milliken had been closed by flooding, including bridges that were washed out.
The flooding was the worst in the state since nearly 150 people were killed in Larimer Countyin 1976 by a flash flood along the Big Thompson Canyon.
The size and scope of property losses remain unquantified, with county assessment teams unlikely to begin preliminary evaluations of the damage at least until early next week, once water has receded, said Micki Frost, spokeswoman for the Colorado Office of Emergency Management.
- Photos · View all
http://denver.cbslocal.com/2013/09/13/warning-issued-about-dangerously-high-boulder-creek/
172 People Now Unaccounted For In Boulder County
Hotline Set Up For People With Missing Relatives Or Friends: (303) 776-2927
September 13, 2013 9:35 PM
A flash flooding sign stands near where local residents look at the raging waters of Boulder Creek Sept. 13, 2013 in Boulder. (credit: Photo by Marc Piscotty/Getty Images)
BOULDER, Colo. (CBS4) – Officials in Boulder are urging people to stay away from Boulder Creek, which is still running at dangerously high levels on Friday.
The flooding has destroyed several residences in Boulder County, officials said Friday morning. They don’t have a specific number of homes that have been destroyed yet, and it’s not clear so far where the worst damage is in the county.
“Most of them have been residences on the sides of mountains that have collapsed or been impacted by mudslides and their foundations washed away,” Boulder County Sheriff’s spokeswoman Heidi Prentus said.
Almost 3,500 people were evacuated at midnight in the city as the Emerson Gulch in Fourmile Canyon west of the city washed out and there was concern that creek would crest. Water levels did rise rapidly, and one point overnight water flowed at speeds of 5,000 cubic feet per second.
Police say people near the creek should move to higher ground. It is running approximately 6 feet higher than normal and CBS News reporter Barry Petersen described it Friday morning as “flowing like a freight train out of control.”
(credit: CBS)
“We are asking people to avoid driving in Boulder, avoid being in areas where water is rising or where creeks are crossing intersections or streets. If you should happen to fall in those waters it would be very difficult to get out and in some cases you might not be able to get out,” Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner said. “We are asking people not to come to Boulder unless absolutely necessary because if you get here you might not be able to get out.”
The evacuation area in Boulder covers the following area:
- From the mouth of Boulder Canyon east to Broadway and Marine North to Pearl
At 9th and Arapahoe in downtown Boulder early Friday morning water was quickly rushing down the road and there was debris in the road.
There are about 172 people who are unaccounted for in Boulder County, according to officials. Relatives or friends so far have just been unable to contact them, so they aren’t officially “missing” at this point. Anyone who is concerned about relatives or friends’ locations is asked to call a special hotline: (303) 776-2927.
Three people have died from the flooding in Boulder County.
“The one man who died in Jamestown was the victim of a structure collapse,” said Prentus. “One male on Linden Drive northwest of Boulder was swept away by the water. He was recovered.”
The Jamestown man has been identified as Joey Howlett by acquaintances.
The girlfriend of the man on Linden went missing when he died and on Friday officials announced that they found her body after an extensive search that involved K-9 units.
There is no way to get in or out of Jamestown on the ground so rescuers from the Colorado National Guard flew in by air and rescued 295 people.
“The roads are flooded above and below were these people are located,” Lt. Col. Mitch Utterback with the Colorado National Guard said. “Helicopters are absolutely the only way to get to them short of parachuting in and then hiking in the mountains to get the people.”
At least eight homes in Jamestown were destroyed.
Homes were flooded. Highways wrecked. Mudslides endangered commuters and residents. President Obama declared an emergency in the state and approved federal aid. Affected residents and local officials used social media to share photos, organize community help, and keep everyone updated on conditions.
Just before midnight, a massive “wall of water” was headed toward Boulder.
http://www.businessinsider.com/flooding-in-boulder-colorado-2013-9
Heartbreaking And Surreal Photos Of Deadly Northern Colorado Flooding
In Colorado at least three people are dead, streets are flooded, and mountain towns are isolated after days of heavy rain caused flash flooding that is expected to continue through Friday.
"In Boulder, the rainfall record for September set in 1940 was shattered," Keith Coffman of Reuters reports.
Surging Boulder Creek floodwaters, coming from Boulder Canyon above the city, are now running through its heart.
"There's so much water coming out of the canyon, it has to go somewhere, and unfortunately it's coming into the city," Ashlee Herring, spokeswoman for the Boulder office of Emergency Management, told Reuters.
The torrent triggered the evacuation of some 4,000 residents late on Thursday. On Friday the National Guard began evacuating at least 500 people from Lyons, north of Denver, after the town was cut off by rising floodwaters.
"There's no way out of town. There's no way into town. So, basically, now we're just on an island," Jason Stillman, 37, who was forced to evacuate his home in Lyons at about 3 a.m., told The Weather Channel.
It's clear why some people are stranded:
The Colorado resident who took the following pictures told Business Insider: "It's so crazy here — just about every other street is closed and there are rocks and trees everywhere."
Geno Verucchi
Geno Verucchi
Geno Verucchi
Geno Verucchi
REUTERS/Rick Wilking
Here's a video:
"This was the bear creek bike path earlier today just a few blocks from the house and Olmec office. This is now multiple feet higher and going over the road the photo was taken from!"
"Traffic is impossible during yesterday Thu. 12 sep. 2013"
"In Boulder we don't have streets but creeks"
REUTERS/Mark Leffingwell
Neighbors survey a dike created to funnel water down 7th Street as heavy rains cause severe flooding in Boulder, Colorado September 12, 2013.
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