Rain started again about an hour ago after nearly 36 dry hours. My rain gauge says it's falling at about a half inch an hour. Radar says this one is big (50-60 miles diameter) and slow. I'm expecting to hear the sirens go off again tonight.
The west half of Boulder County is cut off -- every road is impassable. Those roads were hard to maintain before the addition of several hundred million cubic feet of water -- they're steep, narrow and winding because they're mountain pass roads. And it's September -- our Orange Coneflower (road construction) season runs May to October because concrete tends to crumble when laid in freezing or high contrast (night freeze, warm day) conditions, and fresh asphalt doesn't like cold at all. This is going to be a long, difficult winter, but we're tough and we're smart. We'll get through it. (And our first responders are AMAZING. They've been dealing with everything from rescued geckos to frat boys tubing in flood tunnels to rappel rescues... And they're doing a great job.) However, most of Jamestown and Lyons have been evacuated (250 yesterday, 1200 by airlift today; census says the two towns combined have about 1800 people). Nederland is cut off, but doing okay other than getting low on gasoline.
Longmont (the town just north of Boulder) took a direct hit from the St. Vrain, and due to geography, the north half of town is cut off from the south. Thursday evening, a significant number of county first responders came south to Boulder and went west to Lyons and Jamestown. Then Longmont took the floodwater early Friday morning.
Fort Collins and Loveland got brushed; the Poudre river tends to a shallower and longer slope, but there are communities out on the plains (in the secessionist zone, for anyone following Colorado politics) where the Poudre and the Platte decided to tag-team and behave badly. Weld County is flatter, but also has less flood abatement infrastructure, and has spent much of the last decade allowing sprawl-type development. (Weld County floodplain maps date from the 1980s.) so yes, that's going to be painful, too. With luck, this will distract the secessionists instead of encouraging them.
Arial pictures here -- content warning: lots of damaged infrastructure. Locations are hard to pin down; most of the destroyed road shots are of CO 7, CO 119 and US36 between Boulder and Estes Park or Longmont and Lyons. The eroded river (#36) is I think the St. Vrain.
http://mediacenter.dailycamera.com/2013/09/14/photos-colorado-flood-damage-aerial-views/#36
I'm in east Boulder County, a couple miles from Boulder Creek and several from the St. Vrain. So far, so good, and our creek has stayed in its floodplain so far. (Mine, Coal Creek, is shallower and sources at a lower altitude that has not had a major fire recently. Boulder Creek and the St. Vrain have a steep drop, so those watersheds accumulate both more volume and speed. Also, burn scars. These things count a lot.) The worst part for us has been 1) partner has been working from home since Wednesday*, 2) we have significantly different ideas of necessary preparedness**, and 3) not being able to help***.
* I mostly work from home. We're getting in each other's way and I am accustomed to having time by myself. Cabin fever, it's a thing.
** I believe in go bags, a half-tank is an empty tank, 72 hour and 1 week kits, and checking/setting them out when there's an evac/shelter-in-place potential. After all, saving time saves lives. Partner... Disagrees, but just rolls eyes. (I grew up on military bases, where evac was a possibility. He grew up with tornadoes, where there's little possible prep time.)
*** other than money, but I feel like I should be sandbagging or mucking out or something. But that's my flat-land flood childhood; steep floods mean stay put and wait for the water to recede.
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