Gwen Mars stacks sandbags on Monday in the parking lot of the Fargodome in Fargo, N.D. The city expects to need 2 million sandbags to fight a flood that may crest as early as Friday.
FARGO, N.D. – High school and college students were let out of class Monday to help with sandbagging as residents raced to hold off a threat of flooding from the rising Red River.
City officials planned to fill more than 1 million sandbags, but with more rain forecast they increased the quota to nearly 2 million sandbags — about 500,000 each day by the end of the week.
“We’re confident that we can get the bags delivered,” said Bruce Grubb, Fargo’s enterprise director. “Getting them made is a more daunting challenge.”
North Dakota State University canceled classes Monday and Fargo high schools also excused students to help.
“The students are eager to help. We’re ready to go,” Fargo school spokesman Dan Huffman said.
Across the river outside Moorhead, Minn., Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton High School junior Luke Gable said he was given the option of studying or sandbagging, and decided school could wait.
“Everyone needs help right now,” Gable said. “We’ve got fresh legs and fresh arms.”
North of Moorhead in Oakport Township, where residents had to be evacuated by boat during the 1997 flood, homeowner Barb Groth helped volunteers fill sandbags near her house Monday.
“We’re consider the dry side of the township, but we flooded anyway in 1997. This flood is supposed to be worse,” Groth said. “We’re nervous.”
Fargo city administrator Pat Zavoral estimated the city of some 90,000 residents was about 40 percent protected as of Monday.
Flood stage at Fargo is 18 feet, and the National Weather Service said the Red River had reached 25.3 feet Monday morning. The weather service said the river is expected to crest in Fargo early Friday at around 40 feet — a record.
Officials said the dike protecting downtown Fargo was being raised to 42 feet, but the crest threatens several neighborhoods and hundreds of homes in low-lying areas.
Minnesota and North Dakota were sending National Guard troops to help.
Fargo is borrowing some expertise from Louisiana. The National Guard and the city plan to bring in seven miles of 4-feet high interlocking plastic containers that can be filled with sand to form temporary dikes, a system that was used during Hurricane Katrina.
“It’s collapsible and easy to move,” Zavoral said.
Workers set up about 1,000 feet of the containers in just half an hour Monday.
In Minnesota, Gov. Tim Pawlenty traveled to Moorhead and Breckenridge to be briefed on flood preparations. He said local officials have “been down this path before” and are well-prepared, but there was still work to be done.
“They still need volunteers. The ones who are filling sandbags are getting cold and tired,” Pawlenty said.
While residents in eastern North Dakota battled the Red River, those in the central and western part of the state fought the sudden rise of other rivers from snowmelt accelerated by rain.
Most of the 2,500 residents of Hazen, northwest of Bismarck, were filling sandbags Monday to fight the rising Knife River. Officials said five homes and the city’s golf course were flooded.
The water was nearly 6 feet higher than the flood stage of 21 feet, said Una Reinhardt, of the city’s water department.
“It’s rising about an inch an hour,” Reinhardt said Monday afternoon. It was the highest water in town since 1966, when the river topped 27 feet, she said.
In central North Dakota, Beaver Creek in Linton, the Knife River in Hazen and Spring Creek in Zap were at record flood stage Monday, said Allen Schlag, a hydrologist at the National Weather Service in Bismarck. They appeared to be starting to recede, though snow expected over the next couple of days could add to the problems.
People were advised to leave low-lying areas along the Missouri River in Mandan after the river rose about 6 feet. Schlag said that likely was due to an ice jam on the Heart River, which feeds into the Missouri.
North Dakota National Guard members used boats Monday morning to ferry about five rural residents from farms in Emmons County, said county spokeswoman Marlys Ohlhause.
Also in Emmons County, 50 to 75 homes were evacuated Sunday night in Linton, a town of about 1,300 south of Bismarck, said county emergency manager Shawna Paul.
About 40 families had abandoned their homes in Beulah, said Mercer County emergency manager Richard Sorenson. Beulah is a coal country town of about 3,150 people, northwest of Bismarck.
“There are no injuries — just a lot of people stressed out and worried,” Sorenson said.