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'I lost everything' Mail Tribune / Jim Craven Fay Keene stands over the twisted, rusting frame of her mobile home, which was destroyed by the New Year's Day flood of 1997. Of her 51/2-acre property, five acres remains under water. Lake Creek residents worked together to survive the devastating flood of 1997 By PAUL FATTIG Mail Tribune LAKE CREEK - When Fay Keene visits her property along the south fork of Little Butte Creek, she still can envision what it was like prior to the 1997 New Year's Day flood. Scientists have tough message: how floods help Jon Brazier would be the first to observe that floods wreak havoc on human activity. Shortly after joining the Rogue River National Forest staff, the hydrologist saw the devastation firsthand: His first tour of the Applegate Ranger District was by helicopter to inspect Forest Service roads wiped out by the 1974 flood. And he saw the aftermath of the New Year's Day flood of 1997 on Ashland businesses and the Lake Creek area. He estimates it caused some $50 million in damage to private property in the Rogue Valley as well as $14 million to the forest infrastructure. But Brazier, while stressing he feels badly for those who lose property from floods, must also look at the scientific side. "One of the more interesting tasks we had in the aftermath of the '97 flood was to explain to people who had suffered real damage - lost their house, lost property - about the benefits of a flood," the scientist said. That message was as warmly received as heavy rain in the forecast. Still, understanding the benefits of floods in the natural cycle is valuable to humans, he said. "Floods are very interesting," he said. "All of our streams are developed over a variety of flow conditions. When you go a long period of time between big events, the stream reacts to that." Take the 23-year period between 1974 and 1997, he said. "We really didn't have much in the way of high water at all during that period," he said. "The channels tended to get encroached by vegetation. "When a flood comes in, it tends to reset a channel. Little Butte Creek is a perfect example." During the nearly quarter of a century between floods, vegetation began to grow thick along the stream, he said. "It grew up on alluvial material that had been worked by the '74 storm," he said. "When '97 came, it went in and changed that whole channel. It put in a lot of really nice meanders. "We thought it looked much more natural when it was all done," he added. "It seems to be in better shape physically." The streamside vegetation is now approaching a healthy natural state, he said, adding that floods often recharge stream banks with new layers of soil. "The most interesting thing about '97 was working for four years putting things back together," he said. "The survey of the impact of that flood was fascinating." In particular, he is fascinated by the power of a stream at flood stage. "There is an incredible amount of power in moving water," he said. "We have to keep reminding folks of that. "Deposits 10 to 12 feet deep in Little Butte Creek were reworked by the '97 flood," he added. "That takes a lot of power." While the 1997 flood was a major event, it wasn't as big overall as the 1964 or 1974 floods, he said. "The '97 flood was localized," he said. "The storm hung out in some places, dumping more water in those areas." As a result, places such as Ashland, portions of the Applegate drainage and Lake Creek got hammered, he noted. "As storms move across the land, they tend to get stalled and sit over areas," he said. "In '97, there was a stall over the Applegate." One result was a landslide nearly a mile long in the steep Sturgiss Fork of Deer Creek in the Applegate River drainage, he said. "We had a considerable number of landslides on unstable ground, but a lot of that is related to roads," he said. For the forestland, the 1997 flood was a 25- to 30-year flood, Brazier said. "Statistically, a 30-year flood should happen once every 30 years," he said. "But it's possible to get 30-year floods back to back." In fact, in 1964, the flood hit in mid-December, only to be followed by another major flood in January 1965, he said. Mother Nature doesn't pay much attention to statistics, he noted. Several elements have to come together to trigger flood, he said. "We need to have a good fall rain so the soils are saturated," he said. "You also need a good early snowpack, followed by freezing levels going up to 8,000 or 9,000 feet. Then you need lots of rain." A variation of that recipe occurred in 1964, 1974 and in 1997, he noted. "It will happen again, no doubt about it," he said. There was the comfortable white mobile home, two-car garage, shop, garden and greenhouse. She and her husband, Jimmy, who had died before the flood, had built up the place along the stream's north bank during the past quarter of a century. It was where they raised their children, where they dreamed of retirement. "I lost everything - it all went down the river in that flood," she said. "My house just totally broke apart. My riding lawnmower is buried in the gravel about an eighth of a mile downstream." In fact, only a half-acre of the 51/2 acres of their property remains, she said. The muddy torrent changed the streambed, stripping Keene of much of her land along the otherwise picturesque area. Gone is an oak tree 3 feet across. A large apple tree planted by pioneers a century ago is also history. All she recovered was a 3-pound coffee can of buttons she had been collecting for 40 years. That and a little Santa Claus wall plaque made by her children. "I don't think any of us that lost property have really recovered from it," said Keene, 72. "It's something that's hard to get over." A mile upstream and across the creek from Keene's property, Dan Wilkins and his neighbors helped get over the flood by rebuilding a private bridge across the south fork. The original wooden bridge, built to replace one taken out by a 1964 flood, spanned 50 feet. The new metal and wooden structure had to be 120 feet long to bridge the channel widened by the flood, Wilkins said. "If this bridge goes out there, there isn't going to be any place for us to go," Wilkins said. Because there is no bedrock in that area, the supports for the bridge had to be driven into the gravel bed by a pile driver to ensure they wouldn't be removed come the next high water, he said. The cost of the $65,000 bridge was paid through a low-interest disaster loan taken out by neighbors as well as $4,000 from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The stream appears to have healed itself in the years following the flood, Wilkins said. "The creek has restored itself quite nicely," he said. "Immediately after the flood, the creek looked kind of sterile. Everything was scoured out. "The fish seemed to have weathered it fine," he added, noting he has seen salmon swimming upstream this year. "It's remarkable how much stuff has grown back along the banks." A cabinet maker who has lived along the stream for 18 years, Wilkins noted that local residents worked together to survive the flood. "We've always had a widespread community here, but it's fairly tight-knit," he said. "There was a lot of neighborly help going on during that flood." In fact, residents across from where the bridge was taken out gathered shortly afterward to jury-rig a pulley system to ferry supplies across the stream before the bridge was replaced. They also pitched in to create a fund to help Keene. "She's really a nice lady," Wilkins observed of the resident many local folks know as "Grandma Fay." Keene, who now lives less than a quarter-mile downstream from her property in a rented mobile home, says that community bond continues to be a lifesaver. "I get a little disheartened at times, but I have such good, good friends here," she said. "They just don't get any better." Keene, who periodically cleans houses to augment her Social Security income, has been told by Jackson County officials that she can't return to her property to live. Her home was covered by flood insurance, but the money went to pay off a loan on the property, she said. Shortly after the flood, she and several other local residents filed a claim against the Forest Service, charging that the log weirs installed by government agencies for fishery enhancement broke loose upstream, contributing to the flood damage. Local agency officials have rejected any culpability. Some three years after the flood, officials with the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Washington, D.C., also denied the claim. "It was forever and a day getting anything back," Keene said. "They denied everything." However, at least one other local resident is continuing to pursue the case, she said. "If I could get an attorney to take this on, I would do it," she said. "I truly believe those logs breaking loose were what took out my house. "I know the storm was an act of God," she added. "But those logs building up were not." Meanwhile, Keene says she'll continue living in the area she has called home for three decades. "I'm a fighter," she said. Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.