Floods and Mud

Sunday afternoon we went out to see some of the flood damage on the North Snake Range. We've had some major cloudbursts from the long monsoon season this year, and it seemed that several of them centered over the same drainages, some of which happened to burn in the Hampton Fire. The combination of burn and flood has transported lots of mud for miles and miles. In the photo above, we visited a house that had mud carry the aluminum cans away from the bin.

Desert Boy couldn't wait to go swing on the tire swing. As he ran towards it, we warned him that was something different.

"What?" he asked.

"You'll find out."

When he got to the swing and saw that the ground was now pressing against he, he understood better. The ground level was now higher. No swinging now!

Heavy equipment has been brought in to try and divert future floods from inundating the home, but a lot more work still needs to be done. Up on the bench the alluvial fans have fresh material on them for miles out of the canyons. Even canyons that didn't burn have greatly extended alluvial fans. We saw lots of evidence of overland flow (where water flows over the land instead of going into channels).

The Hampton Creek channel has been partially dug out, partially eroded. We didn't stay long because the clouds in the background were threatening.

This buried cable sign had been buried by a couple feet of mud.

 We really wanted to go up in the canyons, but the approaching thunderstorm convinced us that we had better take the safer route and head home. That turned out to be a good idea, as when my husband returned the next day, he found several places where water and mud had run across the Gandy Road.

Maybe next time we can see more of the flood damage.

In the meantime, here are photos posted on the new blog, Life on the Ranch. If you check out some other posts, you may see some familiar things!