Story Photos
 Three geese seem to be surveying the flooded park in Clatskanie Monday morning. Photo by Greg Ebersole / The Daily News.
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Deluge pounds Clatskanie
Tuesday, December 4, 2007 7:49 AM PST
By Tony Lystra
Printable version
E-mail this articleClatskanie residents scrambled to beat back floodwaters Monday as a Pacific storm inundated the town, closed Highway 30 and forced the Red Cross to set up an emergency shelter.
Sgt. Shaun McQuiddy, of the Clatskanie Police Department, estimated as many as 10 businesses and 20 homes had been damaged. There were no reports of injuries.
Police evacuated the Solhaven Apartments on Bel Air Drive as hillside streams gushed through the parking lot and seeped into about 10 units.
Authorities, McQuiddy said, were bracing for more as tides rose Monday night.
"I don't want to say we're out of the woods on it," he said. "We've taken some good steps to be prepared,"
A puddle swallowed part of Highway 30, the town's thoroughfare. Cars kicked up brown tsunamis as they waded through.
"We've just been chasing water," said Alauna Dodge, the general manager of the Mini Mart, on Highway 30, where employees piled sandbags and newspaper racks in front of the doors.
The Safeway and strip mall parking lot turned into a lake, and the waters lapped against the doors of a lone sedan parked at its center. On the east side of town, the Clatskanie River washed out the parking lot of the Northwoods Inn Motel.
Clatskanie residents said it was the worst flooding they'd seen since similar storms blasted Northwest Oregon and Southwest Washington in 1996.
High water, mudslides and debris closed Highway 30 between Clatskanie's western border and the Clatsop County line. Oregon Department of Transportation workers manned a road block and turned back frustrated drivers.
On Northeast Fifth Avenue, a group of men, including the Clatskanie High School football team, shoveled sand into bags. Volunteers figured they'd handed out hundreds of free sandbags to at least 50 people.
A small crew used them --- largely in vain --- to hold off the waters at the Some Like it Hot coffee shop across from Safeway.
"It just started slowly seeping in through the back door," said Lynn Rutt, whose wife, Katie, manages the shop. "It just kept rising up."
Rutt said he and the store's employees cleaned up with Shop Vacs and push brooms. But by afternoon the floor was still soaked.
"There's no place for the water go to," said Loretta Murray, the building's owner.
Murray said she wasn't sure if her insurance would cover the flood, and she had no idea when the shop would reopen.
"What a mess," she said.
By 1:30 p.m., less than a half dozen people had shown up at the Red Cross's Clatskanie Middle/High School shelter.
Bonnie Davis, a custodian at the school, said she started setting up about 15 cots in the gym around 9 a.m.
"We knew they were coming," she said.
Shelia Cessna, who was in charge of the operation, expected as many as 100 people, many from neighboring towns, would arrive after dark. A cook was planning a pasta dinner. A TV on a cart showed cartoons. And Cessna said nurses would be on hand in case people were in danger of going without their medications.
"I waded in," said Flora Morlan, 86, who headed for the shelter after her daughter's apartment in the Solhaven complex was evacuated.
"There's so much water outside that you don't dare go near it."
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