The flooding threat for Cascade County has subsided for the time being and residents are starting the clean-up and recovery process.
Cascade County said they had a lot of training to prepare for another flooding event, similar to that in 2011.
Just a few months ago, people with Cascade County fire departments, dam operators, and Greenfields Irrigation hosted a meeting for the community to come in and talk about their concerns with the snowpack and flooding.
Training like last March’s Vigilant Guard exercise was part of that.
“That was a nice practice for us because the county and the city worked together with our military folks and the community in order to just stage a planned event. It was all factious, but it helped us for a major event,” said Cascade County Commissioner Jane Weber.
And when the waters rose, she said they were ready.
“When we had heard that the waters on the Missouri River could crest at 17-feet, we jumped out of county incident command mode and jumped into a unified command with the city,” said Weber.
They used this tactic for the first time and immediately started warning people ahead of the flooding.
“They were knocking doors early, early in the morning, and knocking doors well into evenings.”
They were also there with supplies when the waters receded.
The Salvation Army, the Red Cross, and the health department worked together to give out 27 tetanus shots and free water testing kits.
The county also used what they learned from flooding in 2011.
“One thing that we did learn is we got the dumpsters and the port-a-potties out to Sun River as soon as that road was open. We were a day late, I would say, in 2011. This year, we were just right Johnny-on-the-spot when people were going back in.”
Overall, Weber said they did the best they could given the circumstances
“I will tell you, we were in a meeting with rural fire chiefs just the night before and we were all saying, ‘I think we dodged a bullet’ and then midnight, the call came in.”
Weber also stressed to not drive around barricades.
She said while there may not be much water on those closed roads, they are still saturated and traffic can ruin them.
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