Out of the frying pan, into the ... flood

View from the cabin: ash blowing off the burnt mountain

As of today, the Whitewater Baldy Fire is 87% contained.  I went to NM last week to check the cabin and view the awfulness for myself.  As much as one mentally knows about the damage, seeing it in person takes the situation to another level.  This fire is bad, very bad.  Areas that burnt in the past 10 years and were beginning to recover, burned again.  Photos from the Forest Service show upper elevation areas of the Gila appearing like the Mt. St. Helens eruption - nothing but grey ash and black, flattened trees.  Entire watersheds have been destroyed, including the Whitewater, where the cabin is located.


Now the big concern is flooding.  There is nothing to absorb or hold back any rainfall and the Forest Service is calling for massive floods in many drainages.  The situation is considered an imminent emergency. Monsoon rains will start soon, and for the first time I can think of, most people are hoping for light rains; keep in mind that we have been in a drought for years.


What can one do but carry on?  It will take decades for the watersheds to recover, so surviving the upcoming rainy season does nothing to guarantee a lack of flood events next spring or summer, or after that.  So, work on the cabin continues, hoping for the best.  Thankfully, various government organizations are doing their part to mitigate damage through town.  I'm being sarcastic.

When I was a little girl, Whitewater creek was lovely.  After a series of big floods every decade or so, the Corps of Engineers channelized the creek in the 80's.  So now, it looks like what you see here.  No riparian zone to speak of, and nothing to slow down or divert water.  Basically a dead zone, a chute designed to move water at an impressive, high velocity.  And yes indeed, each successive flood was worse than the last.  This view is from my neighbor's property looking south (no fire in that direction); about 100 yards from my cabin.  She had previously planted a line of willows to help hold the berm in place for smaller floods.  

While I was visiting, teams of bulldozers deepened and widened the channel and increased the height of the berm.  They worked 7am to 7pm, Sat and Sun, too.  The process was amazing, if horrible and noisy.  It is difficult to tell from this image, but the channel is now about 15 feet deep.  Previously, about 5 feet tall, the berm is now over ten and perhaps as wide.  I feel there is zero protection from this structure because it is not held in place by anything, so any water will swish all the cobble away to grind into the houses downstream.  In fact, I think the entire enterprise will likely make any flood devastating for anyone downstream.  

So I sign off, hoping for the best.  I just want to finish the cabin and have one good, comfortable year.  Is that too much to ask?  Perhaps so.