Jun 12 2008
Flooding on the Mississippi River: Ahhh, the Memories…
In the spring of 1993, I was a reporter for the Southern Illinoisan newspaper in Carbondale, Illinois, and writing daily for six weeks or so about the Great Flood.
Many of the most exciting stories of my reporting career came that summer as well as many of the scariest moments of my life. At one point, as Mississippi River levees failed, the small Southern Illinois communtiy of Prairie du Roucher had to be evacuated and experts feared it would be the next levee to fail.
As we entered the community, a National Guardsman stationed on higher ground took our names and contact information for our next of kin. The community had established a warning system if the levee was breached. The old iron bell in front of the village hall would be rung. Then, depending on how big the breach was, we would have about five minutes to make it across the bottoms back to high ground. It was several miles and the Guard was warning most people that making it back to higher ground seemed unlikely.
I thought I was terrifed then, but it was an hour or so later, when I was standing on the levee interviewing a state senator and my fiance was filling sandbags that I knew true terror. No loud noise in a horror movie ever made me jump faster or higher than hearing that bell.
The levee was not breached, but the emergency officials were letting us know that even those trying to save the town had to be evacuated. The levee just to the north at Fort des Chartes had been breached and the water was rising rapidly. They were abandoning the effort to save the town in the interest of saving lives.
Strangely, that levee held throughout the 1993 flood, but the memory is one of my strongest.
Another memory from the same day reminds me constantly that help comes from all corners and should be appreciated when it comes. The church women of Prairie du Roucher set up a huge dinner that night to feed the multitudes of people there working to save their town and the reporters and politicians as well. Local prison inmates were given a work detail to help with the sandbagging and striking utility workers and coal miners were also there filling sand bags.
After the prayers were said and speeches made, the ladies told people to line up for fried chicken and barbecue dinner. Some politicians went to the front of the line and the ladies turned them away, insisting on feeding the inmates first. One old lady, speaking for them all, smacked a politician with her wooden spoon, saying, “I didn’t see you lift a sand bag all day except for the cameras. These boys are saving my home!”
Today, the flood waters are still mostly north of here, with Iowa bearing the brunt of it, but the water is coming. At Chester, Illinois, the measuring posint for me, the Mississippi River is supposed to crest next week some 13 feet lower than it did that year, but still high enough to threaten the Chester bridge and mean Menard Correctional Center ( a medium security state prison) will have areas under water again.
This may not be the 100-year flood we saw in 1993, but for those of us along the rivers, the memories and the fear that goes with them are flooding back.
