News Items Today

3 million sandbags have been placed upon 12 miles of snow covered dykes in hope that the now frozen solid bags would act as a wall to keep the City dry.

The river is rising slowly because the freezing temperatures are keeping the ice solid. Warmer temperatures would cause the ice to melt creating a very real and frightening prospect.

The danger is, when the floodwaters crest. If the levee breaks or is breeched, the flood would engulf Fargo even at the now predicted level of 41 feet.

It would be a disaster of formidable proportions and quite possibly the biggest flood North Dakota’s largest city has seen in its living history.

The 90,000 residents of Fargo are praying that the Red river doesn’t breech the level and swamp their homes.

Residents of Fargo, North Dakota are still on high alert, though today the Red River has thankfully levelled off.

This is good news for the residents of Fargo for the time being and forecasters are saying that the river will remain at below or around 41 feet for a few days to come and possibly for up to a week.

However, these predictions are to open to fluctuations of half a foot to a foot, so the water could still rise way above the 41 foot level.

The crest has not occurred yet the forecasters feel, and for the moment it will remain level at around 40.69 feet. It had originally been thought that the river could peak at 43 feet.

These current high water levels have already broken the record of 40.1 feet, topping the one set 112 years ago in 1897.

The agency had thought that the river could reach as high as 43 feet, which is the height of the city’s dykes, but overnight temperatures of below 10 degrees Fahrenheit had slowed the river’s rise.

“Nobody in this valley, no matter how old they are has ever seen levels like this,” Mayor Dennis Walaker stated about the river’s record-breaking height.

The Red River rising has been caused by above-freezing temperatures, followed by heavy rains last week and then warmer weather which have caused the tributaries of the Red River to swell, and the Red River to rise.

Residents of Fargo have been fighting the river for 8 days now and they have rallied, shoulder to shoulder, laying millions of sandbags in a bid to ward off the threatening river.

Though in the end, the sheer weight of water is a formidable force of nature that cannot be stopped. –

American Red Cross workers from California and National guards from around the state have been brought in to help in the emergency situation.

Manitoba residents on the Canadian side of the northern-flowing Red River were also feeling its wrath, when homes had to be evacuated north of Winnipeg after 20 homes were flooded.

Also, Moorhead, Oakport and Minnesota saw homes lost to the waters and many residents, in the region of 2, 600 had been evacuated from their homes in a directed evacuation rather than a mandatory one.

In Oakport Township, home to 1,600 people, they are feeling the power of the water with windows that have been smashed in by the force and dykes that have been submerged. Leaving residents, who would not leave their homes, stranded.

The dangers of being trapped and trying to escape in the flood, is the temperature of the water, the weight of the ice and the swirling currents.

President Obama is keeping a careful eye on things and he stated: “Even as we face an economic crisis which demands our constant focus, forces of nature can also intervene in ways that create other crises to which we must respond; and respond urgently,” he said.

He has declared North Dakota a federal disaster area with aircraft and army troops observing the dykes and the all clear being given for demolition experts to blast the ice jams if needed.

‘The federal government announced a disaster declaration Thursday for seven Minnesota counties. The entire state of North Dakota had received a disaster designation earlier in the week’.

“We are still on high alert. We have not dropped our guard,” Fargo Deputy Mayor Tim Mahoney said.

The next few hours are critical. -