June Flooding

In my post titled "Archbald Park", I have said that recently we have been getting downpour after downpour. Well, it has been raining since Sunday and the last two days this rain caused rivers, creeks, and lakes to rise, streets and homes to flood, and damage and even about three deaths to occur. Let me first say that I live in Jermyn, Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania; this being said for any new readers out there or readers with short memory spans, such as myself. A big storm front came into Pennsylvania, forming from the Carolinas, and carrying along rain showers and storms. Because of some other front or something (I don't even know if I'm restating this correctly) on the boundary of Ohio caused this tropical weather to stay in the northeast portion of the United States, and Pennsylvania is indeed in the northeast of the States. This rain has been here since Sunday like I said, and will be with us until the afternoon today. Now let me tell you why these huge band of showers and storms are strange. Normally when this area of the state floods (the northeast portion of Pennsylvania) it is after some tropical storm or hurricane. For example, Hurricane Ivan brought a huge amount of widespread flooding to this area with huge amounts of rainfall and many rivers went over their flood stage. But the flooding we're experiencing now is very queer because there was no hurricane or tropical storm that caused it. It just happened to come to this area, get stuck by a front, and rain steadly. On WNEP (my favorite local news station), the meterologist, Tom Clark, stated that a storm like this only happens about every one hundred years. So this is truly a lifetime event.

Like I said, river and creeks in the area are flooding. In Jermyn, PA we have two things to worry about; Rushbrook Creek and the Lackawanna River. Just a few years ago, Rushbrook Creek went over its banks, flooding houses throughout downtown Jermyn, destroying roads and bridges, exposing the foundation of one house that was located right next to the creek (and the strange thing there is that I believe the residents of that house last name is Foote), and literally ripping up a stretch of Route 107; a road out of Jermyn that my school bus takes to get to the Lakeland High School. I remember this event clearly. I think it was a Tuesday and school had already begun. The event took place in September. I remember being awoken by my mother telling me that school was closed. I stared at her giving her the weirdest face with the wildest thoughts filtering through my mind. She told me that Jermyn was flooding, that Rushbrook Creek went over, and that Route 107 was wiped out. Route 107 is the only way for students living in Jermyn, Mayfield, and Carbondale Township to get to the high school. I remember going for a walk that day, taking my dog Molly. I walked near the bridges that went over Rushbrook, water pouring over them, street closed. Then later my father and I went for a walk and helped, I believe, one of his friends clean out the flood water from their garage(?). Many of the small bridges in the alleyways over Rushbrook were too also closed, and still remain closed this very day. The next day we had school, and I wondered how in God's name we were going to get up in the country to school. In turned out our bus had to take us to school going up Wildcat Road, but this road is not close to home. The bus had to travel through Eynon to get to the Wildcat. For a few days we had to travel this way, being late for school and getting home late, but it was quite the ride. Then Route 107 became travable, but only by police escort, and only Lakeland buses had the backstage pass to get through. The flood damage on the road was now viewable. Whole chunks of road and railing was gone, on both lanes of the road. Huge trees washed over in the creek. Whole banks of the creek caved in. A wooden bridge crossing the creek to a lone house on the other side wiped away. It was bad, let me tell you. PennDot rushed repairing this road, and I remember my father was an inspector for the job. I used to sit on the left side of the bus on the way home from school and the right side of the bus on the way to school, just to wave to my father on the job. Finally the road was repaired and reopened to all traffic. However this event still scars my brain with unforgetable memories.

I went way off-track there typing up a whole paragraph (more of a novel) about a past flooding while right at this current moment as I'm typing this the rivers in the area are rising and my basement is getting flooded. But back to what I was talking about. There are two H2O threats to Jermyn, PA; Rushbrook and the Lackawanna River. By the 'short' story that I told you, you can sort of imagine the force of the Rushbrook Creek and that just by being a creek that it's no laughing joke. After that flood, I know why they call the creek "Rushbrook Creek". Anyway, now to the Lackawanna River. This river is the one that causes problems for my household because we're located closer to that than Rushbrook. Not in any of the years of my life have I experienced the Lackawanna River overflowing its banks, but it has gotten very high to do so many times, including this time. If this river, however, went over its flood stage, it would cause massive mayhem for Jermyn. But now that I'm thinking about it, I don't think many areas of Jermyn would be affected. East Jermyn would get the biggest punch from this flood though because it's flat and near the river. Any parts of Jermyn down in the Woodlands (a.k.a. rich part of Jermyn near Archbald boundary) near the river would be affected. And probably only the areas in what I call the "dip" in Main Street near Kenendy's beer distributor, because it's flat land near the area and is a "dip" in the road. But any other areas would probably not get hit because there's a big hill up from the Lackawanna River right next to Bridge Street, a street with a bridge that goes over the Lackawanna River -- a commonly closed bridge during floods. Plus Jermyn overall is a bit hilly. The only flat part of Jermyn really is downtown Jermyn on Main Street, but this is still very far from the river due to a huge, steep hill.

Now that we know about the dangers, let me state the current local problems from this flood. After being awoken at ten-thirty yesterday morning and pumping water out of my basement with the aid of my mother, I went for a bike ride (actually two bike rides, one to see what was going on and then another to take pictures [yes, I have pictures!]). First I headed across main street and down to the Lackawanna River, near Veterans' Park. First what I saw was a tree limb that fell on top of two new benches in the park and according to my father later on driving past it, crushed them. I, however, did not see any damage to these benches. On this road near the park you can see the river very good, because it's almost right next to the road but with a hill seperating it. And let me tell you that the river was very high and raging. I kept on walking with my bike starring at the river until I came near the Bridge Street bridge. The river seemed to be almost touching the bottom of the bridge. The bridge was opened at the time of my first ride, but at the time of my second bike ride, the bride was closed, as too was the railroad underpass. I then rode over to Rushbrook Creek (in some on and off showers and sprinkles) and took in the sight of the creek. Memories came back of that one September back when I was in 7th grade (I remember the grade I was in now) when I saw the waters of the creek; dangerous, fast, furious, deadly, raging, and muddy brown. I quickly got away from the bridge over the creek of fear of it going. Why? Back in that one flood in September, the flood washed out a bridge on Madison Avenue near my church (the Sacred Heart of Mary) and the bridge was closed for as long as I remember, I think opening maybe a year later. Details are a bit foggy. Then almost as soon as it reopened another minor flood struck the area and the bridge was forced to close again.

Some more widespread details now. Like I previously stated, the rain is expected to end this afternoon and the sun should shine (try saying that fast) for a bit. However that doesn't mean the flooding is over and that the river levels will lower. The river levels are actually expected to jump up. One part of the Susquehanna River tomorrow is expected to crest at around fourty or more feet, and the flood stage is only in the late twenties or early thirties. So there is expected to be massive flooding there. Waymart, where my brother, sister-in-law, nephew, neice, and their three dogs live, was flooded horribly due to excess runoff from the mountains near the small borough. My brother's basement was flooded and the water was at a risk of damaging their furnace. The Lackawanna River in Carbondale, Old Forge, and Olyphant going over -- even Archbald, a town right next to Jermyn! Also all of the Northeast Pennsylvania counties have some flooding, let it be minor or major, flash floods or just flood floods. Or F.L.U.D.D. from Super Mario Sunshine for the Nintendo Gamecube, who knows?

I don't have too much to add right now, yet I still want to say more but I'll keep that for future updates on this flooding. I will make sure that unless my house is swept away, the power is out, or my desktop and laptop both explode due to unknown reasons that you're updated. However my laziness seems to overpower me sometimes. Oh yes, just to add that my nephew and neice will be staying here for a few days and if you want more offical information on this flood, to head over to WNEP.com and look at the current headlines or if you're looking at this post and it's outdated, search for "june flooding" at their site. I have submitted two pictures to them for use anywhere on the media of this flood, so maybe I'll alert you if they show up anywhere.

Now I must alert you of pictures that have shown up on Buddy Foote's Blog v.2 media. Here you go:

Pictures of the 2006 June Flood, taken on June 27th, 2006:

Just to inform you that I'll present a caption explaining the picture first then the picture that caption explained.


A picture of the raging Lackawanna River taken at Veteran's Park. As you can see, there is a tree in the water.



More of a close-up on the rushing brown waters of the river.



The tree limb that fell on the two benches at the park. In the background you can see Kenendy's beer distributor that I was talking about, as this location would probably be at risk of major flooding if the Lackawanna decided to go over its banks. That would be a shame if this were to occur because Veterans' Park, the area in the foreground that you are viewing, was practically just created.



The Bridge Street bridge located over the Lackawanna. This was one of the two pictures I submitted to the WNEP news station. Like I said before, it seems that the river is almost touching the bottom of the bridge. Being that we're getting about two more inches of rain before this storm comes to a hault, flooding of the bridge may not be impossible.



Another view of the Bridge Street bridge, but showing off the fact that it's closed. If you too also look in the background, you can see the railroad underpass and the yellow barricades enforcing that the road is closed. I wouldn't like to live in those three homes at a time like this.



A view of Rushbrook Creek from the Jefferson Avenue bridge.



Another view of the creek from the side bridge, but different side. This photo shows the force of Rushbrook more dramatically.



A time after my bike ride, my father took my nephew and I for a ride to view some of the flooding in the area. We headed up to Nebraska, Archbald (only way to get there is through East Jermyn) to the Aylesworth Dam. Now I did not mention this at all but this is the highest I ever seen the dam. Aylesworth Reseivor (a.k.a. the Aylesworth Lake) is pretty far from the parking lot. Down a pretty steep hill and there's even a bit of a beach there. But as you can see from this picture, the lake was right next to the parking lot, almost touching it. This is the other photo I uploaded to WNEP.



Some submerged trees -- a common sight there during a flood because the woods around the dam are always flooded.



Some geese enjoying the extra water to move around in.



One other year my father pointed out a sign that was several feet up a tree during a flood (I believe the one after Hurricane Ivan) that said, darn it, I forgot. Anyway, the water at that time wasn't touching the sign and was even inches below it. Here in this picture, the sign is halfway covered with water.



Another view of the high lake. I question whether that deposit of dirt is there so that some equipment can move it around in case the lake goes over in the parking lot to create a barricade of sorts, but there isn't enough there -- not at all. Actually now that I look at it, that was a very stupid question, but I never heard of the backspace key so it'll stay.



A duck enjoying a swim in the lake. Funny part -- that place where the duck is swimming is mostly land, and a hill.



-Just an alert here. My WNEP desktop weather alert just popped up and all of the counties in their viewing area besides two have flood warning. All besides three counties have flash flood warnings.-

Another view of some Aylesworth flooding. You can see the wall of the dam i the beground behind the trees.



Right at the foot of the dam's wall is normally a dirt path. Right now, it's underwater.



Less of a close-up of the wall from the previous picture.



This was too taken near the dam, but in an area of the dam that I think is known as the spillway, I may be wrong. There's big cliffs of both sides of the spillway. And there were plenty of "waterfalls" coming off the rocks due to runoff. Normally these "waterfalls" are only drips of water at the least.



Taken on a bridge in Archbald of the Lackawanna River. River looked pretty high here. I bet this bridge will be closed tomorrow.



Lackwanna River from Poplar Street bridge in Mayfield.



Firetruck and fire officals on a closed street in the heights of Mayfield. My best guess is that they were pumping water from basements, but I may be wrong.



Another view of the Lackawanna from Poplar Street in Mayfield.



Some runoff from the mountain near my father's side job of building a doctor's office near Dickson City and Eynon.



The usual shade of the sky between a rain shower as seen in the past few days.



The runoff trickles down a road near the doctor's office.

That is all for the pictures. I will hope to get more tomorrow, I mean today (that's what happens when it's almost three o' clock in the morning), and Thursday. I will also bring you coverage on this very wet situation. If you're interested and want to know what's going on, make sure you visit www.wnep.com. I must check on the water flowing into my basement so have a good day. As for me, I'll have a very messy and wet one. And this post took me about three hours to type up (it's 2:54 PM now) so apperciate the fact that you were given a read like this.

Adios.