If you click on the above image to enlarge it, near the center of the photo, you will see a small building . . . it is not supposed to be in the water, however the surface of the river is only a few feet from the roof. The trees on the far side of the river are about where the water's edge should be. We were primarily there to serve personal pets who needed a place to stay while their people worked on relocating or drying out their houses. A few animals were surrendered to us and a few strays were brought in as well, but the majority of the animals went back home with their people. I was in the third team to go out for a two week deployment and we ended up closing the shelter at the end of our time there. I will write more later about the day-to-day stuff and the animals later, but I wanted to share these photos and a little information about why we needed to be there tonight. The river was so high in Pierre that the Army Corps of Engineers had to open the "Tubes" to drain water from above the dam down river so that it wouldn't flood over the dam. 
Several times since the tubes were opened back in late May, whirlpool were created above the dam and the tubes had to be closed a bit so that less water was flowing through them. According to our tour guide, who also happened to be the Incident Commander and a South Dakota local, the tubes were transferring 160,000 cubic feet of water per second! 
To give you an idea of what that means, according to Kurt, that rate of water flow would fill the Invesco Field, where the Denver Broncos play football, in approximately 1.4 seconds!!
Several times since the tubes were opened back in late May, whirlpool were created above the dam and the tubes had to be closed a bit so that less water was flowing through them. According to our tour guide, who also happened to be the Incident Commander and a South Dakota local, the tubes were transferring 160,000 cubic feet of water per second! To give you an idea of what that means, according to Kurt, that rate of water flow would fill the Invesco Field, where the Denver Broncos play football, in approximately 1.4 seconds!!Each of the tubes was about 15 feet in diameter, I think. Kurt said after they were opened, they had to be closed back down again temporarily because they hadn't been used before and there was a lot of muck and debris (like whole trees!) that they needed to clear out so the water would flow better. The rumble and vibration was incredible. 
As you can imagine, water flowing at this rate has a lot of power. The river bank used to come straight out from the end of the walkway in this shot, the bank has eroded this much in five weeks! It was very humbling to see all the destruction one little river can cause. (All photos copyright Allison Martin.)
