Went to an event at a camp over the weekend. Just to make a few observations. Like 99.9999% of all debris is gone. You can't locate a twig out of place. Amazing. That being said, it's obvious that many of the low trees along the river have been removed, and a significant portion of the compacted bank around the larger ones has also been lost. Difficult to know how they will fare.
The most striking feature is the 1000s and 1000s of cy of small aggregate stones. These are EVERYWHERE. Covering football fields of what used to be grass and brush. It's obvious that these stones are in the river too and have made some areas much shallower than they used to be. The river appears wider in most places having had the bank cut out especially where cypress were not standing. So you are looking at a wider shallower and sometimes much shallower streamflow.
There seems to be an ongoing effort to dredge the area in front of the dam towards Ingram. I don't know what sort of plans there are to remove the other stones, but it will certanily impact the camps if they lost several feet of depth in spots. HoH already struggled with depth as is. (Yes, I know they moved)
The other observation is that it seemed like in spots you could tell where the bad water got, and it was at times a baseball throw away from the river. Where it seemed to be the most surprising, though, were back in the strainers The high faces with cut valleys between them. The water force and height in those areas were evident. I have seen the videos talking about the impact of these, and how Mystic was uniquely stuck in front of multiple strainers and this may have been me looking for a way to piece this together. You would never think just based on the defined high water mark of the river and state of the debris cleanup, that so many were lost to this event now. No way.
I do think most of these camps seem on their way to readiness for the Summer. Hope everyone has found peace and a way forward.
The most striking feature is the 1000s and 1000s of cy of small aggregate stones. These are EVERYWHERE. Covering football fields of what used to be grass and brush. It's obvious that these stones are in the river too and have made some areas much shallower than they used to be. The river appears wider in most places having had the bank cut out especially where cypress were not standing. So you are looking at a wider shallower and sometimes much shallower streamflow.
There seems to be an ongoing effort to dredge the area in front of the dam towards Ingram. I don't know what sort of plans there are to remove the other stones, but it will certanily impact the camps if they lost several feet of depth in spots. HoH already struggled with depth as is. (Yes, I know they moved)
The other observation is that it seemed like in spots you could tell where the bad water got, and it was at times a baseball throw away from the river. Where it seemed to be the most surprising, though, were back in the strainers The high faces with cut valleys between them. The water force and height in those areas were evident. I have seen the videos talking about the impact of these, and how Mystic was uniquely stuck in front of multiple strainers and this may have been me looking for a way to piece this together. You would never think just based on the defined high water mark of the river and state of the debris cleanup, that so many were lost to this event now. No way.
I do think most of these camps seem on their way to readiness for the Summer. Hope everyone has found peace and a way forward.
