Sunday, June 02, 2013

The Cedar River has Crested

The Cedar River crested this morning and is now receding. The crest was just 18.23 ft. USGS reports that the gauge in Waterloo was reading 0.9 ft high so the initial prediction of 19.9 ft was in error.

So a lot of excitement but very little damage this time for my home town. This is good. I also think it is good that we had this little scare. If anyone was starting to forget the disaster of 2008 it was a good reminder. We need to respond. We need to rebuild our riverside areas to withstand the inevitable reality that rivers do occasionally overflow their banks. This is life, this is the course of nature.

Our flood walls and flood plains responded this time and Cedar Rapids didn't sustain much damage. This is good. I hope that we don't take this as a confirmation that what we have done is enough. We are not done.

Peace