Oh yeah.
"The river's gonna rise, gonna rise, there'le be dancing in the streets if the river DON'T rise"
I think that I may have changed the words a bit.
The other name for this post could be "It began much like any other day".
I got to work shortly before 9. And seeing as I have been riding my bike to work for the past couple of weeks I figured that I had enough time to go and take a few pictures of how the water has progressed.
So here is how things stood at about 9:00 am. You can look at the pictures from a few days ago and see that things really haven't changed all that much. Those upside U shaped things are a bicycle stand.
In behind the library, red brick building to the right, there is a little water in the parking lot.
So I go to work and most of the morning is spent doing routine things. I take lunch and then start to clean the dye/felting kitchen (student's can be messy little things). After about 20 minutes of cleaning, I decide to call mom and let her know that Liam has some homework to do (he wouldn't tell her). Mom tells me that dad and Von have to evacuate the cows and that she will be staying the night with us. And while I was on the phone Joe (the marvelous maintenance man (and my immediate boss) that we are so fortunate to have) come looking for me with a rather frantic expression on his face. I quickly (and rather rudely) end my call and look expectantly at Joe. "you are needed in the basement" he says. "We need to get everything out" So away I go.Some of the stuff in storage that needed to be moved up. Most of this made it.
Basement clay studio. All of the small portable thing made it out. The shelves and tables didn't.
There is also a couple of photography studios that are in the basement. Most everything made it out.
The store for the school is also in the basement. Here is most of the store supplies that are now on the first floor in a classroom. This is where I spent most of my time boxing and lugging.
At about 3:58 I remembered that I needed to get to the bank before it closed and sprinted over in my apron. After I was at the bank, I went to the causeway again to see how things were progressing. So here things are as of 4:00.
Then back to the school for more lifting and lugging. Thankfully there are two elevators that we could use to get things out of the basement. Here are a couple of students that are starting the monumental task of moving the clay mixing supplies.
The freight elevator was struggling to get this load up to the third floor. ( The guy in the gray shirt is Joe who left his office until most everything else was moved)And then the power went out at about 4:45. Thankfully the only person on an elevator at the time had just arrived on the second floor and the doors had just opened.
Someone had ordered pizza and so we were able to have a small snack. Here are some of the students and staff that had helped in our frantic effort to get thing moved to higher ground.
There are things in all of the corridors.
Some of the equipment was brought up the stairs after the power was shut off. I will now say that we had no notice of the power being shut off. I will also mention that the powers that be may have tried to contact us but seeing as everyone that was able was lugging and moving, nobody was manning the phones. The courthouse next door was not informed of the flood problems until about 4:00. Hmmmm.In any case, here are 4 guys struggling to get a pug mill up the stairs. If you want and explanation of what a pug mill is, just ask. Tomorrow.
They were also moving the rest of the powered clay supplies and I had to leave the building because of the dust that was being kicked up. I have asthma and am very sensitive to dust particles in the air. So I went to see how things were progressing on the cause way. Here is a quick shot of the parking lot behind the library.
And on the way home, I found that the way was blocked. I had to rethink my route home.
Bill took the kids down to see the water after supper tonight. SO come back later to see those photos. I need to get to bed!
5 comments:
Ack! My heart was pounding as I looked at the pictures of the rising water. This afternoon I listened to a podcast of As It Happens where they interviewed an emergency management official reporting on the preparations for the rising flood waters. I do hope you stay safe. What a great effort to get all the school materials to high ground. I'll be watching for more news.
Yikes! How often does this happen?
Usually, the annual flood doesn't affect anything more than the closure of a few low lying roads and intersections. And some people might get a few inches of water in their basements.
In recent memory, there were 2 bad flood years though: 1973 and 1979.
In 1973, the St. John river waters crested at 8.63 m above sea level in Fredericton (i.e. 2.1 m above the flood stage). The cows from our dairy farm were evacuated that year.
In 1979, the waters crested at 8.05 m above sea level. The cows remained on the farm that year, but I remember visiting a neighbour who had caught a fish is his basement.
Today, the water is supposed to crest somewhere in between 8.4 and 8.6 m.
Thankfully this does not happen every year.
How does a fish get into a basement ?
When the river spills its banks and the fish can swim across the road and in through an open basement window.
Post a Comment