Hurricane Agnes, Irene and disaster somewhere else

      This weekend's Hurricane Irene killed at least 21 people in eight states. That number was relatively low, emergency personnel say, because officials from South Carolina to Vermont preached about the storm's danger all week. People apparently listened and got out of town. On Sunday, Route 30 was loaded with cars heading back home to New Jersey, Delaware and New York-- even more, it seemed, than normal tourist traffic.

This house  floated 5 blocks. 1972 Rapid City, SD.   USBS

      Throughout the northeast, people remember Hurricane Agnes, a 1972 disaster of historic proportions which killed 48 Pennsylvanians, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Agnes formed in Mexico, crossed over the US southeast and stormed over New York City, like Irene. But unlike Irene, Agnes stalled over northern Pennsylvania and southern New York. She just stood there and churned for days, dumping rain. Much of it went into the Susquehanna River watershed, flooding Wilkes-Barre, Harrisburg, York and everything along the way. Before it dissipated, Agnes had killed 130 people in the U.S.  

     River dams were beyond capacity; Conowingo Dam has never seen another week like that. Some experts predicted a dam failure, which would have destroyed much of what was down river.

     Even people who weren't here yet (like me) or too young know about Agnes. Awful, amazing and deadly Agnes.

     But--  Just a week before, a flood and dam break killed 238 people --nearly double Agnes' total-- in Rapid City, South Dakota, and it's generally lost in history to Agnes. Agnes was the Big News then, crawling up from Mexico, looking for the bulls eye that was New York City. Like Agnes then, Irene was on everyone's mind this week; millions of people were glued to various media to get the  up-to-date path of the storm. An estimated 65 million people were affected by Irene; there wasn't much news aside from Irene. Big news = big population.

      On the other hand, Rapid City is the county seat of Pennington County, the home of Mount Rushmore. Only 100,000 people live in the entire county, about a quarter the population of York County.  Not big potatoes, in the overall scheme of things.

     We were on a Colorado vacation at the time, and heard about the Rapid City disaster. Being in the neighborhood-- west of the Mississippi River-- we raced to Rapid City to photograph the event. Now, the disaster had little interest in the small town of Dixon, Illinois, where we lived. Because of all the news about Agnes and heavily populated northeast, no one cared about South Dakota. I shot it anyway. 

The Chapel Lane bridge above Canyon Lake was washed out.

      My photos and negatives shot at Rapid City have disappeared long ago, but I remember the stories. One man said he was coming home from work when he was met by a ten-foot wall of water. About 15 inches of rain fell in the mountains above Rapid City, and when the water hit the Rapid Creek Dam, it broke and exploded into the city. The wave picked up the man's truck, floated it downstream and set it down, almost gently, he said. He remembered a bulldozer being tumbled down the road like a toy. Houses were picked up off their foundations and set down again blocks away.
     Of course, those were the happy endings. We also remember piles and piles of rubble that were once homes. Rescue and recovery crews pulling bodies out of piles of debris. The wailing of orphaned and injured children and lonely parents. All were gone-- babies, adults, pets, homes, businesses and schools. The odors of diesel engines working, the musty smell of laying water. Five people were never found.  Three firefighters and three National Guardsmen died at work.

     The final tally told a horrific story, beyond the deaths. About 1300 homes were destroyed, and another 2,800 were damaged. Five thousand vehicles were destroyed. Remember, the town of Rapid City is just a bit larger than York.

     It was an unusual way-- macabre?-- to spend vacation, but a memorable one, nonetheless.  Irene was the big news this week because of the millions of people it affected.

     How do you think Irene would have been reported if it targeted Kansas or Wyoming?


     Both photos from http://sd.water.usgs.gov/projects/1972flood/photos.html