Washington’s ‘historic’ floods wash out roads, show importance of building for changing weather

The storm that’s left parts of B.C. under water didn’t spare communities south of the border in Washington state either.

Bellingham saw immense flooding on what are usually quite dry thoroughfares and reduced them to waterways.

“This is the type of flood event that we see over many decades, highly unusual, something that our crews who have been here for 30 years have never seen before. We’re seeing water where we’ve never seen it before, we’re seeing to a level we have not seen before, we have creeks flowing at levels we have not seen before, and lake levels that are higher than they have been in our records. So this is a historic event,” explained Eric Johnston, who is the public works director with the City of Bellingham.

He says crews are working hard to keep roads clear of water — and to keep people from driving into flooded areas.

The Nooksack River continues to overflow its banks, impacting even areas on the Canadian side of the border.

On Monday, Washington Governor Jay Inslee declared a severe weather state of emergency for parts of the state due to the flooding, which followed days of heavy rain and wind.

Thanks to all the crews working to keep Washingtonians safe. After speaking with officials in Whatcom and Skagit counties earlier today, I issued a severe weather proclamation. Read more here: https://t.co/YEffvrfwTT… https://t.co/jG4yN0roEY

— Governor Jay Inslee (@GovInslee) November 16, 2021

“…A weather pattern that began on Oct. 27, has resulted in saturated soils, which, when combined with the significant precipitation during the event that began on Nov. 12, has created flooding conditions on multiple rivers, and forecast rain along with anticipated rain and snow at mountain elevations are expected to exacerbate flooding conditions,” a notice about the proclamation reads.

Johnston says crews got a bit of a break in the weather Tuesday, but it’s not clear when areas like I-5 and some other major routes will be open again.

For now, he notes the focus is on addressing major closures.

“My heart goes out to folks who have seen property damage. We’ve seen people who have got water in their ground floors of their businesses, water in their rental properties, water in their homes, and that’s a significant impact to our residents and our hearts are really going out to those folks who are struggling,” he told CityNews Tuesday.

Related articles: 

• B.C. storm recap: Flooding displaces thousands, washes out roads

• Highway 1 closed, evacuation orders in effect in Abbotsford due to flooding

With climate change continuing to shift weather events each year, Johnston says engineers and people can only do so much.

However, he says the state has seen some success with projects, such as those that work to restore creeks to their previous natural flow conditions.

“The city (of Bellingham) has been working on climate resiliency or increasing storm intensity for the last 20 years, and we saw some real benefits to that in yesterday’s event. We’re hoping to get more of an assessment of that in the next couple of days, but we’re not going to be able to build our way out of these types of weather events,” Johnston explained. “We can build infrastructure that is resilient and can respond to it, but we are not going to be able to prevent the type of damage that we are seeing with these significant wind, storm, rain, fire events.”