During the evening of February 8 or 9, I received a call from my parents who were born and raised here in the Santiam Canyon, but now live in Corvallis. Because of the story of evacuation carried by KATU, Channel 2, they called to find out just how bad the flooding really was here.
I began by telling them what I knew; there was a plugged culvert up on highway 22 by the Chevron Station, water was running across the highway; there was a slide down by Fishermen’s Bend; the road grade had sunk to some degree just East of Mill City, city limits; our family home was high and dry.
Still worried Mom asked if I’d heard anything about an evacuation, insisted I check and that they would call back in an hour.
I checked. There was nothing to the rumor according to the men on duty at the Fire Hall.
Mom and Dad called again right on time. I told them what I’d learned, which they said they would pass on to my daughter who had frantically called them after hearing the evacuation reports of the Santiam Valley, (Valley?), and having been unable to get through.
Finally, Mom asked, “How high up on the South Railroad Bridge Pier is the water?”
“About 8 feet below the bottom of it.” I replied.
Mom and Dad both laughed, then said, “Call us back when it gets half way up the pier itself.”
It never even touched the South Pier footing, a level the river rose to fairly often before the Detroit and Big Cliff Damns were built, and I never made that call.