DARRINGTON – The flooding in Snohomish County on Dec. 10 and 11 was relatively minor, but try telling that to homeowners along the Sauk River near Darrington.
After a record flood in October 2003, the river changed course drastically in some places. Ever since, high water has caused new fears for residents as the Sauk shifts ever closer to their homes.
Merle Green stayed up most of the night Dec. 10, unable to sleep as the water rose. She had monitored the Sauk’s progress all day, first in the morning and again in the afternoon during a work break.
Michael V. Martina / The Herald
“Just watching how fast that bank was eroding was incredibly frightening,” the 56-year-old Darrington native said.
She had watched a huge logjam build up nearby. Long-standing trees had lost their soil and tipped into the river. Forecasts had predicted the river would not crest until 3 a.m. that day.
Trying to sleep with so much on her mind was futile, so she baked Christmas cookies and turned the television to a station that offered lovely images and soothing background music.
Every hour, she would step out with a flashlight to monitor how far the river had advanced into her yard. She had already told her husband, Craig, that if the river reached an old cedar tree inside their fence, it was time to go.
That night was hardly the first time the Sauk had strayed. The loose volcanic soil in the area gives way easily to the river’s whims, allowing it to meander widely. In the past three years, the shifting river has destroyed several homes in the area.
The Greens knew many of those homeowners. Still, it seemed impossible to them that the river could have migrated so far in their lifetimes. Her grandparents bought the 80-acre property in 1916. In 1975, the river could not be seen from where Merle and Craig Green chose to build their new house.
“We built as far in the corner as we could so everything else could be left as natural as possible,” Merle Green said.
“This wasn’t riverfront property,” Craig Green said.
Over the years, other landowners tried to bulk up their riverbanks with riprap and boulders. But environmental rules to protect threatened salmon species and the waterway’s designation as a wild and scenic river make such projects difficult to do. And some of the bigger floods wiped out those bulwarks anyway.
Knowing all this did not help Merle Green’s state of mind as the river advanced in the wee hours of Dec. 11. Wide awake and worried, she watched the inspirational images and messages on TV. One spoke to her Christian beliefs:
“The voice of your God hovers above the waters,” it said.
“That was like an epiphany for me,” Green said. “I realized I wasn’t alone … and I calmed down. I haven’t had a calm like that in a long time.”
At 4 a.m., the Greens heard a loud crash. The cedar had finally succumbed to the river. However, the Greens determined that the water had already begun receding, so they stayed put.
Merle Green remembers sobbing later that morning when she saw the cedar tipped over in the river, its roots exposed. The river had swallowed a swath of land 150 feet wide in one night.
“My spirit went with that tree,” she said.
“It’s a sick feeling,” Craig Green agreed.
It’s also a sick feeling for them to hear the occasional insensitive remark that they shouldn’t have built a home there. They have three generations of memories attached to the land.
Merle Green grew somber as she later surveyed the damage. Most of their wooden fence, once hundreds of feet long, and acres of pasture beyond had vanished. The remnant of the fence is truncated by the advancing bank. Their house now sits about 100 feet from the river.
She looked at the upturned cedar.
“It was like the last thing between us and the river,” she said.
Reporter Scott Morris: 425-339-3292 or smorris@heraldnet.com.
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