Floods in North Dakota

Note the brown water stain on the bottom third of the sign

Click on this photo to see where I have marked red arrows of flood level

Businesses empty...

Emergency workers still cleaning up...

Piles of rubble...

Houses gutted....

More debris...

Shocking scenes

Even the trees are water marked

Our North Dakotan friends had mentioned the floods and land falls that had occurred in recent months in this area, but when Murray and I accidentally found ourselves driving through an affected area, we couldn't believe the level of devastation that we saw. We had seen a billboard advertising an RV park to the west of Minot, and as it was late afternoon, we thought we would pull in for the night. As we pulled into the gates of the campground, we didn't get very far before we saw mud and signs of high water level on campsites. We actually reversed out to save getting bogged, and followed the directions on the GPS to get us back to the highway.

Each street we went to turn down (as directed by the GPS) brought us to a 'road closed' sign, so we had to keep going. After this happened several times we started seeing piles of debris on the roadside. We then realised that the homes all seemed to be gutted and the debris was the insulation and internal walls pulled out, leaving the inside of each home just an empty shell. All the home contents had long been removed by the owners/tenants since the floods of June 23rd, and now the huge task of clearing rotting interiors had begun. We could see the water level on the houses above the window level. Even the trees were stained by the flood waters, which makes us wonder how long the water stayed at the high level. The damage to the area was so extensive, yet we have heard from locals that compensation will only top around $3000 per household. A cash- strapped country. Similar to what happened in Brisbane I guess, in that most homeowners either didn't have or couldn't insure for river flooding or water inundation from overflowing dams.

It turns out the area we found ourselves in was Oak Park. It was just one township around the city of Minot that was affected. The only way out was to turn around and go back out the way we had come in - all the other roads were damaged and remain blocked off - almost 7 weeks after the flood. It made us realise how traumatic it would be if the same thing happened to us, and our thoughts went out to those affected. We have heard that the community spirit is strong and many fund raisers are being held to support the displaced people.

When we realised we would need to keep moving to our usual campground about 40 minutes south - and where we would stay put for 2 weeks - we called in to pick up some groceries. We were stunned to see people camping in the parking lot - they had no-where else to go as local campgrounds are either washed out or full. KMart & Walmart are apparently allowing the flood victims to park their campervans there for free. Of course they have no power or water connections, so life can't be easy for them.