Closed: Gone Fishing

Although you would never be able to tell from the safety of the Boucher home high on a hill, Ft Kent and a good portion of Aroostook County in Northern Maine experienced very significant flooding beginning yesterday. An above average snowfall combined with 3.5 inches of rain caused huge swelling of waterways and road washouts. The Fish river poured over its banks, flooding West Main St. and The St. John was very close to spilling over it's30 foot dykes.

Jon and I had this vision of us in hip waders lugging sandbags to protect the town from the invading waters. We called around to ask about the need for volunteers early in the morning to no avail so I went to work as usually. After about an hour of checking my email, I was told that I should start moving my office materials to higher areas. Now I work in a Wellness center that also houses a gym with treadmills, weight machines, bikes and elipticles that all had to be lifted up as well. I am assuming that this preparation is in advance of a possibility of flooding in the next few days....that is until I look out and see that Main street is already full of water and that the flood is starting to roll into our parkinglot. Jon had been on his way to pick me up from work but as no cars were being let downtown, he had park about a mile away. When we finally found each other we decided to take a look around and see if anyone needed help to escape the water. We helped one of the business owners to grab stuff from his office and then wandered around looking for other places to volunteer. We traveled by foot all over town looking for places where we could be of use. All that we really saw were people standing around and staring at the oncoming water and saying "Wow, that's pretty crazy." over and over again. We asked everywhere we could, and even went to the command center where all the Emergency Management people were sitting around chatting and eating sandwhiches. It was absurd. There was no sandbagging, there was no resistance to the water's movement...nothing. Every so often some trucks would dump some dirt next to the waters apprach hoping that it would stop it. Sometomes I think that's Ft. Kent's Mantra in fixing problems: just put some dirt on it and it'll be fine-even when that problem is far too much snow and ice or a flooding river....

I have yet to go back downtown to see what the damage is like at work. I think I will take the trip later today. It appears that no one was injured during this flood. Our thoughts go out to all the bussiness and families affected by this extreme weather. Ft. Kent is already a town that has its fair share of difficulties and the town, I think will take this pretty hard as many of the town bussinesses have been affected. I don't think we'll know the full effects of the flood until the water recedes in a few days.

Hope all is well. Send some good vibes up to the County!!! Be Well,
Kim