More Rain Overnight Leads to (More) Southland Flooding

This has been the story in the southland for the last few days. Rain in large amounts over a short period of time has left the ground saturated. Runoff is causing southland waterways to rise and streets to flood. Both the Blue River and Indian Creek left their banks overnight, and went much higher than they were Friday night/Saturday morning. Indian Creek went up over 103rd street at Wornall, putting three to four feet of water in businesses on the creek side of the street. Luckily because of the late hour, there were few motorists out, although a few did need assistance out of the fast rising water. As of 1300, Indian Creek had returned completely to its banks, still running fast, but no longer flooding.

Photos here are of the Blue River, which is still flooding, at Red Bridge Road between Holmes and Blue River Road. This stretch will be closed until the water is down.

Seeing a lot of these barricades these wet days. This one bars travel from Holmes east on Red Bridge Road.
Construction equipment at the new Red Bridge Road bridge site up to its fenders and more in water.
A view of the overflowing Blue River, taken from the Red Bridge. The bridge itself was never over come by water, but it was very close.

This pipe was in a tidy little pile yesterday with similar piping--now it has floated over to the other side of the road. Other piping was noted west of where it had been before. Note the water over the road, and pedestrians checking it out on the other side. This is on the east side of the bridge. The water appeared about mid calf high, with a fairly vigorous current flowing from right to left. I did not wade in.

The water filled the picnic area on the west side of the bridge--a mind boggling amount of water--and topped the road here. You might be able to make out some folks walking through the water. Your intrepid reporter made the same journey--water up to mid calve in spots with a mild current flowing from right to left. Definitely enough to bar travel by passenger cars.

Yup, we need a break from rain. How much do we need that break? According to the Weatherbug station at Ruskin High School, we had 5.27 inches of rain fall after midnight to this morning. I had four inches in a cup in my backyard. According to the Ruskin rain meter, we have had for June a total of 15.25 inches. That's a lot of rain and we are very very soggy around here!