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The INDEPENDENT, February 7, 2008
The
INDEPENDENT
Published on the first and third Thursdays of each month by
The Independent, LLC, 725 Bridge St., Vernonia, OR 97064.
Phone/Fax: 503-429-9410.
Publisher Clark McGaugh, clark@the-independent.net
Editor Rebecca McGaugh, rebecca@the-independent.net
Assoc. Editor Noni Andersen, noni@the-independent.net
Opinion
Flood public hearing tonight
There have been so many meetings and town halls
since the flood, it’s hard to keep track of them. Much
information and some mis-information have been float-
ing around at the meetings and otherwise. The basics
seem to be that FEMA (Federal Emergency Manage-
ment Agency) makes rules and the City of Vernonia
has to enforce them by ordinance. It’s tempting to say,
I’ll help you raise your house, then you help me with
mine and then we’ll both go help somebody else and
forget about all the rules, regulations, and possible
(note: possible) sources of financial help. But, that’s
probably not realistic. In any case, please don’t miss
meetings where decisions that may seriously impact
your home take place. We urge everyone to attend and
participate in the Public Hearing tonight, starting at
5:00 p.m. at the Vernonia Community Church on State
Ave., followed by a special City Council meeting at
7:00 (same location). The ordinances addressed at the
meetings are on building (including planting trees) in
the flood areas and substantial damage (homes with
substantial damage will have to raise, move or demol-
ish). At a public hearing (though no new testimony will
be accepted) the public can speak in favor, in opposi-
tion or as a neutral party on the ordinances.
Good deeds get recognized
Vernonia Police Sergeant Mike Kay, Vernonia May-
or Sally Harrison and Columbia County Commissioner
(and Vernonia resident) Tony Hyde presented awards
and certificates to Flood First Responders at the Coun-
cil meeting on January 22. It is our pleasure to list each
recipient here and add our thanks to those they have
already received: Life Saving Awards to Norm Brown,
Lt. Ben Davis, and Lt. Dean Smith; Certificates to (in
no particular order) Tom Moss, Wayne Vaughn, Kristi-
na McCord, Holly Vaughn, Caressa Brooks, Shelley
Cota, Teressa Bernardi, Dan Owens, Michelle Kay,
Scott Laird, Christie Davis, Catrina Conner, Charlotte
Koch, Helen Hudson, Dawn Moss, Mike Orth, Cindy
Ball, Alexis Posley, Colleen Posley, Ray Cota, Shandi
Cota, Dylan Vaughn, Dan Murphy, Robin Murphy, Syn-
da Allen, Genny Fischer, Kathy Spinden, John Spin-
den, Paul Epler, and Noni Andersen. (If we missed any,
Mike, let us know so we can include them.) We wel-
come the opportunity to shine the light of appreciation
on those who worked hard for all of us during the Flood
Please see page 3
Ike Says…
By Dale Webb, member
Nehalem Valley Chapter, Izaak Walton League
So how deep was that
water during the flood?
Well, that is a loaded
question, it really depend-
ed on where you were, but
I do have an answer for a
specific spot. If you start
prodding around, you will
find that all measurements
of flood heights are given
in feet above sea level. The high water mark at
the sewage pump station at the confluence of
Rock Creek and the Nehalem River was 618.3
feet. I happen to have an elevation drawing of
the sewer lagoon system and an elevation of
592.5 feet is given for the diffuser, which is level
with the bottom of the river, just a short distance
down-river from the pump station. So the answer
is, approximately 26 feet of water was flowing
down the Nehalem River channel at this location.
So how much water was flowing down the riv-
er? I don’t think we will ever truly know, because
trying to measure the water that was outside the
channel is extremely difficult, but here is a stab
at the flow at the sewer system diffuser. The to-
tal distance across the river at this location, from
the lagoon dike to the far bank at eye level from
Webb Way, is around 75 yards. Since it would be
difficult to figure the flow outside of the channel
we will just figure what was in the channel, about
half the above distance, which would come out
to 112 feet. We know that the depth was around
26 feet and all we have to know now is how fast
the water was flowing. Having previously con-
ducted stream flow readings, experience tells
me it is very common to find stream flows in the
3-4 foot-per-second range, but flood waters real-
ly move, so let’s use 6 feet-per-second. To find
Cubic-Feet-per Second (CFS), which is used to
measure stream flows, we simply multiply the
width by the depth by the feet per-second-of-
travel. This comes out to 17,472 CFS, or for
something we can better relate to, 130,699 gal-
lons of water per second flowing through this
area. So the amount of flow in just one minute
was over 7.8 million gallons of water, quite im-
pressive indeed. Remember, this is only a very
rough estimate and does not take into account
the other half of the flood water that was flowing
through the flood plain next to the channel. Addi-
tionally, there was the water that was flowing
through the gap down at the Blue Heron area.
Here are some other high water mark read-
ings: Washington Grade School, 618.5; just
down-stream from the sewer lagoons on Webb
Way, 616.0; at the concrete block house by the
pump for Lake Vernonia, 615.2 and 614.0 (two
readings for some reason); at the primitive
campground at Lake Vernonia, 611.6; the West
Oregon Electric substation at Alder Street,
608.9; lastly, a reading close to Knickerson
Creek and Highway 47, 603.2.
The Army Corp of Engineers has been con-
ducting the elevation readings and they have
Please see page 3