Serving Central Oregon since 1903 • $1.50
MONDAY • February 15, 2021
Coronavirus in Central Oregon
Summit High extends closure as outbreak grows
Bulletin staff report
An outbreak of COVID-19 traced
to Summit High School students
who attended a party a week ago
had infected 24 students as of Sat-
urday, and extended the closure of
in-person classes at the Bend school
through Friday.
According to an email from prin-
cipal Michael McDonald sent to
Summit High School families on
Saturday, Deschutes County had
confirmed 24 cases of COVID-19
among youth who attend Summit
High and were primary or secondary
exposures from the party. McDonald
said that while Summit had in-per-
son classes Feb. 8 and 9, there was
no confirmed spread of the virus at
school.
However, to prevent the potential
spread of the virus, the school will
return to distance learning through
Friday, with an expected return to
in-person classes and activities Feb.
22. That will allow the equivalent of a
10-day quarantine from the last time
students were in the school building
with academics or activities, McDon-
ald said.
Students who did not attend the
party or have contact with those who
did, and who have no symptoms, are
considered low risk for COVID-19
exposure, McDonald said. But
county health officials encouraged
anyone who may have been in con-
tact with others who were exposed
or who live with elderly or medically
fragile family members to consider
isolating from those family members
and assume the youth or adult may
be contagious.
In preparation for the eventual
return of in-person classes, school
district staff has completed a deep
cleaning of classrooms and common
areas in the school and left air scrub-
bers on overnight.
McDonald said he has heard ex-
pressions of frustration, anger and
sadness from students, staff and fam-
ilies in regards to the outbreak.
“These are all reasonable re-
sponses,” he said in the email. “We
are here to connect with students
who need support during this time.
Please reach out to our counseling,
nursing and administrative staff, visit
our Student Mental Health webpage
or review our list of resources for
mental health during COVID-19.”
McDonald called the situation “a
learning opportunity.”
“We are all ready for the pandemic
to be over and to ‘go back to nor-
mal,’” he wrote. “But we are not there
yet. We need to redouble our efforts
at masking, distancing and staying
home when ill if we want to resume
some ‘normal’ activities, like in-per-
son learning and athletics. We must
all remember that our actions outside
of school have a huge impact on what
can happen inside our buildings.”
DEER
VALENTINE
Winter
wildlife »
BY RYAN BRENNECKE • The Bulletin
ABOVE: Snow cascades down as a mule deer nibbles on a cluster of
berries while feeding on vegetation along Simpson Avenue in Bend
on Saturday.
RIGHT: A pair of geese feed in a small area of open water as sheets
of ice cover the Deschutes River near the Old Mill District following
a frigid winter storm on Saturday. Monday is forecast to be partly
sunny with a high near 45 degrees. See Weather, A10 »
OSU STUDY FINDS
Climate change will exacerbate
flooding in Columbia River Basin
The Oregonian file
A duck glides slowly past a partially submerged speed sign at Clackamette Park, where
the Clackamas and Willamette rivers meet in Oregon City in1996. Researchers at Oregon
State University have found that climate change will cause more severe flooding in the
Columbia River Basin over the next half century.
TODAY’S
WEATHER
A bit of rain
High 45, Low 32
Page A10
INDEX
Comics
Dear Abby
Horoscope
Flooding in the Columbia River Ba-
sin is expected to increase dramatically
in scale over the next half decade as
the climate warms, according to new
research from Oregon State University.
The severity of floods large and
small — on the Columbia, Willamette
and Snake rivers, along with hundreds
of smaller tributaries — will increase
and, in some places, the flooding sea-
son will grow longer.
That’s according to a new study
A7-8
A4
A4
Kid Scoop
Local/State
Nation/World
A9
A2-3
A4
Puzzles
Sports
Weather
from researchers at the university,
published last month in the journal
Hydrology and Earth System Science.
“The flood you’re used to seeing
out your window once every 10 years
will likely be larger than it has been
in the past,” the study’s lead author,
Laura Queen, a research assistant at
OSU’s Oregon Climate Change Re-
search Institute, said in a statement.
Queen ran simulations using
streamflow data collected from nearly
400 sites throughout the Columbia
River Basin and western Washington.
A8
A5-6
A10
The simulations included data from
1950 to 1999 and expected stream-
flow from 2050 to 2099.
“This was the best and most com-
plete set of data,” said co-author Philip
Mote, a professor in the College of
Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric
Sciences and dean of the Graduate
School at OSU. “It shows that the
magnitude of one-, 10- and 100-year
floods is likely to go up nearly every-
where in the region. These are pro-
found shifts.”
See Flooding / A4
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