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Great background explanation Jeff!

This is not over by any means either, 55mph winds forecast for tomorrow and continuing rain. The Skagit is supposed to crest again over flood stage. The soil saturation allows trees to go down more easily, so it’s an additional impact to the crazy amount of flooding.

Last night the Town of Pacific had a levee failure and folks woke to evacuation orders from officers knocking on doors and a helicopter at 2 AM.

A few big reservoirs always start draining down in fall to allow for spring run off, they were used to absorb and slow impacts up north.
The towns down stream on the Skagit would have been completely devastated.

Ross lake was down to 1584’ lake level, it went up 10’ in 48 hours- it’s a 23 mile long lake/reservoir, a mile or more wide in places and over 500’ deep near the dam.
Baker lake went up 11’ in the same period, it’s 8 miles long.
I’d bet both spillways on Ross are dumping- I would love to see and hear that! same with Diablo and Gorge lakes all situated in that valley and hydro power projects.

Prior to that the Skagit had severe flooding and is still a risk if a levee fails, the Skagit drains 150 miles of mountain sides, and is second biggest in the state.


We have been lucky where I’m at about 45 minutes North of Seattle, seems the biggest rainfall totals were north and south of us.
The Stilliguamish River is 3 miles north, it hit flood stage and caused some closed roads but nothing major comparatively.

I’m hearing Highway 2 will take months to repair, that a major E-W route. No doubt lots of my favorite trails are also damaged, the full impacts won’t be known until spring.

The Governor is filing a Major Disaster Declaration asking for more support from the feds.
National Guard are out doing a ton of work and support, I saw a convoy heading South on I 5 recently.
I appreciate them putting themselves in harm’s way and in poor conditions!