Storm leaves trail of washouts, flooding

By Barbara Brown
Last Tuesday evening was hot, but bearable to be outside enjoying sunshine and a summer evening.
That was until about 8 p.m. when clouds quickly filled the sky, overcasting the landscape with the familiar appearance of thunderstorms.
Nine minutes later, tornado warning sirens wailed in Chisago City, Lindstrom and Center City after a weather watcher reported cloud rotation to the Chisago County Sheriffís Office.
Calls poured into the sheriffís department communications center reporting all kinds of weather-related problems including lightning strikes, motorists stranded in their vehicles and roads being washed away.
County Road 9 suffered damage when a wall of water came flowing over a stream overpass and eroded the underside of the southbound lane toward Hwy. 95.
On a normal day, driving southbound on CR9 toward Hwy. 95, which is lined with two sections of guardrail, the Hay Creek River is practically unnoticeable.
Wednesday morning, the volume of that small river had spread to cover a 40-foot wide area.
The reedy grasses that line the road way, ditches and small creek bed were completely flattened, showing exactly where and how much water flowed over CR9 Tuesday night.
One North Branch woman had a closer-than-comfortable encounter on that CR 9 bridge.
The 49-year-old woman was saved by Chisago County Deputies Tim Sittlow, Steve Husmann and Matt Beckman and Cpl. Scott Sellman before her car was overcome by the Hay Creek River.
The woman was headed northbound on CR9 from Hwy. 95 at about 10:45 p.m. June 24 when she found her vehicle surrounded by fast-moving water.
She called 911 on her cellular phone and asked for help at the same time that water started coming into her 1992 blue Ford Taurus, according to a Sheriffís Office report.
Deputies arrived on the scene armed with life jackets and tow ropes.
Within about 10 minutes, the river rose to more than 3 1/2 feet deep over the road.
Several deputies and Almelund fire fighters worked to get the woman out of her car in the rapidly rising river.
Deputies and fire fighters got the woman and themselves to the north side of the bridge only seconds before the womanís car was swept away by the rushing water until it slammed into the guard rail, according to the report.
One of the Almelund fire fighters went home and got a boom truck, which he used to cross the waters to the north side of the bridge. Everyone was loaded into the boom truck and taken to safety on the stable south side of the bridge.
When Deputy Sittlow returned to the bridge area at about 6 a.m.,Wednesday, he found that the water level had receded, but that the earth and asphalt of the roadway had been washed out, leaving the southbound lane of CR9 unsupported.
Chief Deputy Bob Shoemaker said emergency calls flowed through the dispatch center until about 5 a.m. Wednesday when the weather event began to settle and residents could get to the business of cleaning up.
When residents of County Road 70 awoke Wednesday morning, they found it difficult to go to work because a culvert running under the road had broken up and washed away, leaving a 20-foot chasm through the road north of Hwy. 95 in its wake.
County highway maintenance crews said CR70 could be closed for quite some time because of the break in the road.
While most of the roads opened by the end of last week and were driveable by the weekend, crews still were working Tuesday, July 1, to repair CR70.
Other damage included flooded yards and crop fields and clogged drainage ditches that remained filled with standing water throughout the week.
Minnesota Department of Transportation officials could be seen throughout the rest of the week driving along Hwy. 95 looking for other signs of damage.
Officials from the Chisago Soil and Water Conservation District made stops on CR70 and CR9, among other flooded areas of the eastern part of Chisago County, to check erosion, damage to the vegetation and how water was settling throughout the region.
None of the damage was permanent, said Craig Mell, director of the Chisago Soil and Water Conservation District. However, Mell said there is no way to make up for the lost soil that has been washed away from the rain.
Soil and Water officials can help any land owner with advice on how to repair damage and how to prevent it in the future, Mell said.
Officials will return to the damaged roads and waterways periodically to check their status.
Eastern Chisago County took the brunt of the storm with 6 inches to 8 inches of rain in Almelund, Kost, Sunrise and the Wild River State Park area, according to the National Weather Service and Post Review weatherman Jeremy Grams. North Branch received more than 4 inches of rain and Stacy received just more than 3 inches.
Rush City recorded about 1.5 inches of rain.
The North Branch police department did not receive any distress calls for the night, but kept up patrols watching for downed trees or power lines in the area.
Stacyís maintenance manager, Tom Archibald, said only one road in town suffered when rain soaked the dirt road and caused slight collapse of the structural integrity.
Short bursts of hail were reported throughout the county.
The rainfall for the North Branch area broke the June rain record, set 56 years ago at 3.16 inches of rain on June 21, 1957, Grams said.
Not only did it break the June rainfall record, Grams said the June 24 storm now is the 8th highest daily total rainfall for any day of the year in North Branch.

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