The Rivers Edge

It's runoff time. Usually that means that we get dirty water in the water treatment world, which, oddly enough is actually easier to treat than clean December water. Anyway, this year we had watershed snowpack levels around 248% of normal. That means a lot of snow, add to that a nice cold spring, and you have the opportunity for a lovely runoff year. Normally the Colorado River in the summer runs around 10,000 cfs, runoff on a normal year is around 20,000 cfs. This year we are expected to peak around 34,000 cfs. While this won't be the record year of 1983 which was 40,000 cfs it's still pretty serious.

My work has been preparing for this flood for a couple months, but it wasn't until the last two weeks that we got into high gear. We have been building berms and filling sandbags, lining banks and watching the weather like crazy. Since our treatment plant is right along the river, we have to take all this seriously. In the record year of 1983, the river decided to use it's old channel, which happens to be our across our driveway, so the operators were literally boating in to work. This year we have a boat, life jackets, and plans for evacuating the building for things like documents and some of my lab equipment. Hopefully we won't have to do that.

However, since the river usually crests around 2 a.m. we have all volunteered for shifts to watch the river in the middle of the night. Mine is for Thursday morning 2-6 a.m. For some reason this has my mother and my supervisor very nervous. My supervisor, because I am the only woman who volunteered (apparently the secretaries aren't interested in being team players) and my mother because, well...she's my Mom. The crest is supposed to be here on Wednesday or Thursday, right when I will be checking. I'm not worried, but to make my Mother happy, maybe I'll give her a call so she knows I'm safe! A 3 a.m. check in should make her very happy indeed!