500 Year Flood

Yes, we are in the middle of this flood. We are about 10 minutes away from the devastation. It is totally devastating here. So many lives ruined and destroyed. We know many people that will lose their homes and businesses from this. Have you been watching Good Morning America, Fox News, CNN? That's us!

This is called the 500 year flood because they have calculated the chance that a flood of this magnitude could happen and it is a .2% chance that this could happen every year so that equals out to once every 500 years!

Right now there is nothing we can do to help people but as soon as this water crests (gets to its highest point-which the water is expected to rise another 5 feet or so), and then recedes, which will not be for weeks, our church will make teams to go in help these people totally demolish their homes and start over.

The largest church in the area, Parkview, will totally lose its building. It is covered up to its roof in water!

I was able to snap a few pictures, but they will not do any justice at all to the devastation.

Row 1: Our neighborhoods backyards. If you put the second and third picture together they make a panoramic view. In the second picture you can see a pole sticking up, this pole is a light pole in a parking lot. Last summer we had a baptism here. We parked by that pole and Jenna was baptised a short walk from there. There should be no water there. It is going over the dam. There should be a HUGE drop between the top water and the water on the bottom. The water rushing over the dam sounds like Niagara Falls. So noisy! All of it is water that shouldn't be there. The 4th picture is a picture of a rescue boat going up to a house and making sure that everyone is evacuated, we stood on the other side of the sand bags there and watched them go from house to house.

Row 2: This is a sand bag wall, as you can see the water is leaking through it. The water will eventually rise over it and flood the businesses across the street. The 3rd picture is the Iowa River Power historic dam. (Right behind the Iowa River Power Restaurant) Jeff was able to go and walk on that bridge on Wednesday but they have since closed that bridge because of high water. This is 1st avenue, across the street is McDonalds, Hardees, Cookie Bouquet, etc. Once again the water should have a HUGE fall to get to the bottom of the dam but you can see if it almost even. The 4th pic is looking down stream with the restaurant on the right. Not all of that should be water.

Row 3: Jeff and the girls look over the railing at all the devastation at the Iowa River dam. Haley is in our backyard looking at all the water. And on a lighter note, last night we ate supper around 8 pm at Zio Johnos and this is the girls sharing a huge plate of spaghetti. Yesterday we got the toilets in the house and the girls were so excited. They no longer have to use the port-o-potty (or squat in the backyard). Haley had to go and although we had no toilet paper I let her. She was excited to be the first to use the potty.

Please pray for the devastation in our area. Most of the roads/interstates around us are closed. Travel is not allowed or advised in a lot of the area. Yesterday when we were down taking pictures they were closing roads all around us and we had to take many detours. We are due to have more rain tomorrow and Sunday which will devastate the area more. We are expecting much more of our area to have manditory evacuation. Luckily we live on a hill, althought the Marina is spilling into our backyard. Our neighbor has sandbagged his house! We aren't taking that precaution yet, we are higher than he is.

Is this how Noah and the people of his time felt?