Historic Hood River
Flood Stage
2-9-2023
Notes
This Alan Winans slide was also with the Camp Yallani views, but it’s from much later. It’s dated to March 27, 1996, which was one of the key flood dates for the Hood River. I recall a USGS scientist explaining to me this event laid the foundation for the November 2006 flood which created the river delta we see today. I might be misremembering the numbers, but I think he said this event brought 750,000 cubic yards of sediment, but the delta was still mostly submerged until another 750,000 yards were deposited in 2006. I believe both events were “glacial outbursts” where rain on top of snow and ice sent a pulse of water filled with sediment downs the river channel. Can someone verify the geology/hydrology?
Category: Downtown Hood River
Tags: 1990s, bridge, flood, Hood River, Mt Hood Railroad, Powerdale, Winans
Tags: 1990s, bridge, flood, Hood River, Mt Hood Railroad, Powerdale, Winans
Basaltgrouse
The 96 floods were in early February when a Pineapple express dropped about 5 inches of rain on top of 12 – 18 inches of snow in the lower elevations. It was quite an event to experience.
ArthurB
Hmmm, I wonder if the date on this slide was incorrect or if it shows a later flood event. The river is close to the level of the rails.
L.E.
Basaltgrouse pretty much covers what happened. February 7th and 8th 1996 still hold the record for rainfall, on top of January snowfall.
Checking weather records at the Hood River weather site, March 27th 1996 was a record snow fall of 1 inch. Otherwise, I think March of 1996 was uneventful. February of 1996 was memorable.
starboard
Perhaps film was developed (remember that?!) in March?
ArthurB
I’m sure you’re correct starboard. The slide holder says 3-27-96-15, which must mean it was the 15th frame of a roll of film he developed on 3-27-1996.
The day before the Dodson landslide I was in the waterfall corridor experimenting with a medium format camera taking Fujichrome transparencies of frozen waterfalls. I still have the film. Although the images are nothing special, they remind me how the pineapple express came after a deep cold snap. I recall at Multnomah Falls the culvert had frozen solid and water was flowing across the road. Not a great condition to start dumping warm rainwater.
nels
Mr. Winans took a great shot there. So much going on, yet beautiful;
Not an accident; excellent composition and settings.
Basaltgrouse
If my memory is correct, an excavator operator lost his life while trying to clear one of the plugged culverts near Multnomah Falls when the machine slid into the pool.
Jeremy
This was in February. I was a sophomore in high school and it was the first time in my life that Hood River was completely "locked in." Well, maybe you could go east. This even cancelled my basketball games for three weeks while they fixed the roads. My basketball coach was so annoyed he quit the next year and referenced this event.
Rusty
Yeah, we were locked in for several days.. Couldn’t get out by road in ANY direction.
Some roads in the area were closed for months, like the Underwood cutoff between H141 and H14 in WA, as well as old highway 8, between Catherine creek and Lyle.
You can still see a large pile of basalt cobble that washed down from the hills above along highway 14 between Bingen and Lyle.
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.7109507,-121.344661,3a,61.5y,23.8h,92.37t/data=!3m9!1e1!3m7!1sRDHojHG_YwS24wG_LwxanQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!9m2!1b1!2i51?hl=en