Who was that praying for all the rain? Are you done yet? Wait, maybe we should remind ourselves where we live and what our flood and drought history tells us.
Yes, we’ve had five years of official drought but we’ve also had sky-opening winter deluges in those years, too. Remember, this is Northern California where it almost never rains from May to October, only to see our rain gauges spill over several times each winter, with occasional wet springs.
This is commonly called a Mediterranean climate but it is actually a Pacific climate where the seasonal ocean currents and temperatures dictate our acute weather changes.
The original inhabitants, the Pomos, adjusted to these wild weather changes with a semi-nomadic lifestyle, moving their villages to follow the fish runs, oak harvests, moon cycles and accesible water.
Modern habitants — us – have more complicated living patterns. We’ve built permanent houses too close to flood zones. We’ve built dams and put asphalt on the ground that speeds runoff and aids flooding. We’ve also stressed our summer supply of water to maximum useage when the Pacific currents deal us multiple years of drought. Before we built the Lake Sonoma and Lake Mendocino dams, our Russian River would run dry many summers, only to overflow a few months later by late fall.
This week we lived through an official flood of the Russian River. Before the most recent storms the river level at the Hacienda Bridge was six feet, rising to 37 feet just three days later.
For most of us it was a familiar routine of jumping puddles, clearing a few fallen tree limbs and paying extra attention to the weather forecast. For a few others, notably down river at Forestville, Guerneville and Monte Rio, the high water required a temporary evacuation to higher land or temporary shelters. A few foolish or stranded motorists had to be rescued from the rising waters.
There was more than enough rain last weekend to turn many prayers into anti-flood prayers. Weather conversations easily divided the newcomers from the oldtimers. The newcomers got their feet wet while putting out ill-timed sandbags. The oldtimers watched familiar landmarks, hunkering down in place. But with more people living in more places temporary shelters were needed for some in Healdsburg, Guerneville and Sebastopol.
So far, the flood of 2017 is ranking well below the historical floods like the Christmas Flood of 1955 or the Valentine’s Day Flood of 1986.
But this is still early January and with rain prayers or not, it looks very likely that more rain will come our way. Newcomers and oldtimers alike should keep up their river watch and flood preparations.
Today’s meteorologists have advanced radar, satellite and weather tracking tools that allow for much earlier and more precise predictions. The most recent series of storms was projected over a week in advance — enough time for travel plans to be changed, flood-proofing to be extra fortified and even school hours to be adjusted. Releases of water from Lake Sonoma also were moderated to ease downstream impacts when possible.
We are grateful for the service and efforts of our local fire and rescue volunteers and the volunteers at the emergency shelters. We all can assist by avoiding unecessary risks of driving through standing water or ignoring severe storm warnings or evacuation orders.
If there is a moral to this story it is that no matter how sophisticated our forecasts might be or our best flood preparations put in place we still live in a region with extreme natural weather patterns. One day we’re praying for rain and the next we are filling sandbags. Soon we might declare the drought officially over, only to have the summer Pacific currents curl in a new direction and bring us another very dry summer, with cloudless skies very familiar to the ancient Pomos.
— Rollie Atkinson
