Could Texas Flood Tragedy Happen Here?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
We continue to get updates and more info as it
comes in on the horrible situation in Texas. And it's
a pleasure to welcome John Winkler to the program here.
John'sapapio Missouri River Natural Resources District General manager, has been
a tremendous resource for us over several flooding events. John,

(00:21):
good morning. Well, I just wanted to get a picture
for our area, and I'm I'm told this is like
a thousand year event down there or whatever. But could
this kind of thing happen here?

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Well, it's a little bit of context. You know, that
area in Texas has has very limited flood mitigation infrastructure,
very few dams and no levies due to the topography.
The soils are different, topography is different. It's questionable too
if our atmosphere could in our area, could you know,

(00:55):
hold that much precipitation, Although we've learned Mother Nature always
bats last. So if you if you could replicate that
storm over the Omaha Metual area over our area, and
it depended on how widespread it was, it would simply

(01:17):
be catastrophic. I think that amount of precipitation anywhere would
be catastrophic. We can reasonably even with our robust blood
control infrastructure, dams and levees, we can reasonably accommodate seven
to ten inches in a twenty four hour period, and
seven inches is our one hundred year reign event. But

(01:42):
it's not unusual when we have a significant storm for
the Patio Creek to go up twenty feet or more so,
and it happens so fast. If you see some of
those time lapse of videos from Texas, I mean you're
talking about minutes those creeks are, you know, up fifteen

(02:02):
twenty feet, right, And kind of one of the reasons
why we strenuously oppose things in the floodplain is because
it can happen so fast and there's there's literally no
to zero warning sometimes and so that's why, you know,
that's why we do what we do every day, and
we try to mitigate those things. But that type of

(02:25):
storm over our area would it would be I wouldn't
even be able to calculate the cost and the damages
and probably loss of life.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
Right. Well, one of the things we don't have a
we don't have a Gulf of Mexico next door. That
probably helps us a little. There's so much moisture, So
what do you make of the criticism that we've heard
about their warning system down there. There was a former
sheriff who said he was pleading for an improved system

(02:55):
as late or recently as the late eighties. This seemed
to me to be like a purfec storm type of situation,
no pun intended. It happened in the middle of the night,
and as you say, it was a catastrophic amount of rain.
Would a warning system have helped?

Speaker 2 (03:11):
A warning system probably would have helped, although if you
look at the time of the day, which is in
the evening, and we figure average time is about for
someone to kind of pack their you know, to get
a few things and get out of an area is
about fifteen minutes, and that's too long. So even with

(03:35):
the very best of warning system and when it occurred,
it probably would have saved some, but there still would
have been there still would have been others that would
not have been able to get out. I mean, it
just it just happened too fast, and it couldn't happen
at a worse time. We've got a great warning system here,

(03:57):
We've got rain gages, we've got we work with the
Weather Service, we work with all of our emergency management folks.
And for example last night, even before it rained, there's
we had multiple eyes on all the gauges and everything
throughout the night. And so people can rest assured that

(04:19):
we can't prevent it. But one thing we can try
to get out of early warning is possible. The Weather
Service does a great job of getting out those watches
and warnings and it's and it's a perfect lesson for
everyone else around the country is when they issue those warnings,
you have to pay attention. Yes, yes, because a lot
of people, well it's another warning and they ignore it. Well,

(04:41):
it just happened.

Speaker 1 (04:42):
So fast, Sam and tornados just quickly here. John I
got a question from Larry on email. Do you guys
clean debris such as dead trees out of the creeks
The area he says he lives in as a tributary
of the Papio that runs for blocks that is blocked
by dead trees. So what's do you have a regular
cleaning project for dead trees in the water.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
So what we typically do is we work with if
they're our bridges or if there's the railroads bridges or
whoever's bridges there, we will clean the debris around them.
Around those to try to get the flow enhanced. One
thing about creeks, and I don't think very many people
know that they own to the middle of the creek.
So if it's private property, there's no way that we

(05:27):
can go along there and clean that up. Yeah. So
it's same with the rivers everybody like, for example, the
platte everyone owns. If you're a property owned a plat
you own to the middle of the river and if
you step out of your trespassing. But so there are
certain areas that if they're if they're that clogged, and

(05:48):
you know, we could work with the city or wherever
jurisdiction there is to maybe help do that. It would
help if you could find out where that exactly is
and we would be more than happy to go take
a book, make sure, yeah, and we'll see what we
can do.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
Hey, John, thanks always great to have you on. Appreciate
it frame much ultitude.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
Just one more thanking Gary. Just our thoughts and prayers
to the folks of Texas and thank you appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
John Winkler here on kf A B Morning News