Flood Pole Mystery #WordlessWednesday

For the first winter in a long time, we are doing a lot of walking outside.  Fortunately, the weather has had enough relatively mild stretches (ignoring our 41 inch snowstorm in December).  

Lately we've added some new neighborhoods to our routine.  On a walk this weekend, I saw this - a plot of land with poles and a "no mow zone flood mitigation" sign.  It's near the Susquehanna River, in a neighborhood which has had flooding in the past.  I know about no mow zones, but what are those poles for?

Joining Sandee at Comedy Plus for her #WordlessWednesday.

#SkywatchFriday - Mushrooms and Sunsets

I'm always looking for a novel way to watch the sky.

But before I show you my newest method, I want to thank everyone who has visited and commented on my blog over the past couple of days.  The wacky weather the Northeast United States has been experiencing has led to flooding in many places.  Tuesday, it was the turn of my area of upstate New York to experience flash flooding.

I am not personally affected but we have more rain in the forecast for tomorrow, and we are not too far from the possibility of river flooding.  If you read my blog posts of September, 2011, you will learn how a flood impacted the life of many in our area, including my spouse and me.

Just one story out of many thousands.

So today, I watch the sky for many reasons.

Take last Friday for example.

Last Friday, we had a "calm before the storm" sunset.  Red sky at night - it was a sailor's delight, but not for long.

I think we were being given a message.  Or a warning.

But what about my newest method of watching the sky?

This is a yellow (the yellow didn't show up too well) mushroom I found growing Wednesday on the grounds of the Broome County Courthouse near where I work in downtown Binghamton, New York.

See the center?  It is full of water from the rains of Tuesday.  And, in that water, the sky is reflected, clouds, trees and all.

Join Yogi and other bloggers watching the sky every Friday on #SkywatchFriday.

The Difference Two Years Makes

Sunday, September 8, 2013.  A gorgeous late summer day in the Triple Cities of upstate New York. We got up to about 68 degrees (20 Celsius) with a light breeze and plenty of sunshine.  (Some like it warmer, but, for me, this is ideal.)

Today is Blues on the Bridge, a wonderful celebration of music and community in downtown Binghamton, New York.   I'll be there later this evening.

But two years ago today, it was so different. The rain was pouring down and communities all over New York and Pennsylvania were getting ready to evacuate.

An interesting mailing came to me yesterday from our town of Union, in upstate New York.  The brochure started out by saying:

"If you received this brochure in the mail, you live in an area where potential flooding is a concern...."

What a masterpiece of understatement, for those living in portions of my neighborhood.  

(The sign on this house, located in the hard hit portion of Westover, near Johnson City, New York, is hard to read.  It was erected in August and reads "23 months still no help from FEMA Gov. Cuomo Sen. Libous We are drowning!" (For my foreign readers, FEMA is our Federal Emergency Management Agency.)

On September 8 and 9, 2011, that house, and others on that street, nearly did drown.  In places, the water depth was some eight feet.  The road was closed for almost a week.   That house, and others, are supposed to be bought out.  The plan, as far as I know, is to make a park out of that part of our neighborhood.  But there has been no buyout (yet), and instead, we got this brochure from the town.  And their advice to us - buy flood insurance. (more on that later).

Inside the brochure is this flood map, titled "Town of Union Flood Prone Areas."  The map shows 100 year and 500 year flood zones in colors.  Supposedly, I'm in a 500 year flood area.  So was the above street.

There is just one tiny problem:  A disclaimer, saying "Note:  Flood Zones based on 1988 FEMA flood maps".

Since then, we've had two 500 year floods in five years.

The waters came within several feet of our house and we did have losses - and we know that next time - and there will be a next time - it will be worse.


Since 1988, climate change has come.  As I mentioned, our neighborhood suffered two 500 year floods, one in 2006 and a worse one in 2011. At some point they will redraw the flood maps, but they weren't redrawn after the 2006 flood and I'm not holding my breath about when the next update will come out.

Businesses in our neighborhood still struggle to survive.  Some have gone out of business.  One, BAE Systems, employing over 3000 people, had its building ruined and came close to leaving our area all together. (Our elected officials worked tirelessly to keep BAE in our Triple Cities. They were able to, thanks to other vacant buildings in the area being available for immediate occupancy, and the granting of a lot of tax breaks.  However, BAE has only committed for another three years, the last I knew.)

And it just isn't us in upstate New York.   All over our country, all over our world, cities and countrysides are being flooded.  News of flooding somewhere is almost constantly in the news.  Last year, Superstorm Sandy.  This year,  Missouri and North Carolina in the United States, among others. Calgary and other parts of Alberta, in Canada.  Germany.  Austria. Poland (along with some other European countries.) India. Indonesia. Myanmar.  There were a lot more.  So multiply us by - thousands? millions? and you have a global disaster in the making.

We MUST wake up and realize our new reality is here. I've talked to contractors in our area, and there are ways to build that will help a building survive a flood and help the cleanup be easier. 

Our 2011 floods were from a record rainfall year that ended with two tropical storms in less than two weeks.  This year, areas some 30 miles from us (Cortland, NY) were flooded from heavy summer rains, and, earlier in the year, other parts of upstate New York (Utica) were hit by storms which "trained" - in other words, one storm followed another which followed another, causing unrelenting hours of rain.

Flood insurance?  In the United States, homeowners insurance does not cover flood.   Flood coverage must be purchased separately.  Its underwriters depend on flood maps to charge a correct premium. Current, accurate flood maps are a must - and yet we don't have them here in our area.  I suspect many other flood maps haven't been updated to the new reality, either.

So, what happens if the flood insurance program goes bankrupt? Has anyone given that any thought, given that the flooding situation in our country is worsening?

A headline in yesterday's local paper said it well:  "Flooding lessons have yet to be learned".  And today's headline:  "Open wounds Long road to recovery for residents hit during '06, '11 floods"

It's not a happy anniversary.  I, and others, become anxious every time it rains.

But for today, we are enjoying Blues on the Bridge, knowing that some of the organizers were, themselves, flooded out in 2011.  But they survived and we will, too.

Don't count Binghamton, or Westover, out.

Floods and Roses

We've been getting a lot of rain this spring, and the rivers are running just a wee bit high.

Friday, I took a lunchtime walk with a work friend down to the confluence of the Susquehanna and Chenango Rivers on the edge of downtown Binghamton.  It amazes me that a small city in upstate New York whose downtown has a number of vacant buildings (a couple of which have suffered fires in recent years) can have such natural beauty just a few hundred yards away.

The roses are out near a historic marker.  The Chenango Canal, which no longer exists, was a 97 mile canal.  This was near the southern end.

A number of roses bloomed nearby.  One, above, had two colors of flowers on the same plant.  I've seen this a couple of times before on rose plants, and I wonder how commonly this happens.  All I can tell you is that most of the roses were purple, and they had a lovely fragrance.

But not all was well with the river.  It was just starting to flood the park. (To the right, the Veteran's Memorial Bridge, built in 1923.)

Another view, with trees visible in the river.

There is a trail, the Chenango River Trail, that runs from Confluence Park up to Court Street, the main street in downtown Binghamton. (Court Street crosses the Chenango near where this trail deadends on Court Street.  To the west of the Chenango River, Court Street turns into Main Street).

The muddy river water was flooding the lowest end of the trail.

It's been 21 months since this river last flooded, and none of us want a repeat. Rain, rain, stay away! For a while, anyway.

I'd like to bring you one more rose picture - a rose after a rain.  Dare I say it, but I love raindrops on roses....

Just not floods.

Are flowers after a rain one of your favorite things?

Hope Floated

Like too many people in the United States over the past three or four years, we in the Triple Cities of upstate New York know what it is like to be flooded.  Our flood of September 2011, called "The Flood" here, happened after the rainiest summer on record, capped by two tropical storms several days apart.  The last one dumped about 10 inches of rain on us. 

Our two local rivers cried "Enough" and even neighborhoods not officially in flood zones flooded.

Now, 19 months after the flood that did so much damage to my neighborhood and other neighborhoods in the Triple Cities, I find myself looking back - and trying to look ahead.


I was inspired to do that after noticing the land around the vacated building that, until September 8 and 9 of 2011, was a busy BAE Industries plant employing around 1350 skilled workers in one of the largest wood frame structures in the United States, is fast becoming a garbage dump. We are talking about 34 acres here, some of which fronts Main Street just west of Johnson City, New York.

 I took this photo at a bus stop in front of the building.  BAE had thoughtfully provided a bench for those waiting for the bus.  I don't know who is dumping the garbage, but it is disgusting. I'm pretty sure some of the guilty are bus riders but I think there is a lot of "drive by" dumping going on.  I wouldn't mind picking some of it up so I don't have to stare at it daily, but that would be called "trespassing".

 This building is supposed to be torn down eventually but in the meantime, the county provides security.  Something tells me I will have to fight to get this cleaned up, the way I had to get snow cleaned on the sidewalk the first few times this winter.  Maybe it's time to give the Town official who finally helped me with the snow removal a little ring-a-ding....

So what else is going on in walking distance of where I live?

This was an office of a beloved doctor.  No more.

I don't know if someone is trying to finally rehabilitate this property, but this is what it looked like about two weeks ago (note, some of these pictures are some two weeks old but trust me - nothing much has changed.

Some houses will never be inhabited again.  They are awaiting a Town buyout.  In the meantime, they rot-literally.  I don't know if this is specifically one of the houses that will be razed after the buyout but it is located by a street that will never be fully inhabited again.  Part of my neighborhood, lost forever, peoples lives floating away on a tide of muck and diesel oil.

So many people lost so much.  Up to now, I've had a rule not to take pictures of residential property impacted by the flood.  I've only taken pictures of commercial property- until now.  I apologize if anyone reading this ever lived in this house, because I do not post these to titillate.  I live here, too.

There is one glimmer of hope.  We have lost businesses, including BAE, and including a long-time business that was in this building - Tony B Tire. Ironically, this building never flooded but their customers moved away.  Now, someone is moving into the building.  One can only hope they will be as good a neighbor as Tony B's was.

So many flood stories in this nation.  So many impacted by national disasters. 

Wish us in Westover luck.

Disasters - It's Our Turn

I am 7 plus hours away from home, on vacation.

This afternoon my son called.  We were in Freeport, ME enjoying the outlet mall shopping on a rainy day here in the State of Maine.  We knew our home area was having very heavy rains and were worried.  But we tried to put it out of our mind and have a good time.

I had to evacuate my mobile home, my son said.  He (he's a night worker) was sleeping and a policeman pounded on his door. There was a mudslide and he had to leave his mobile home park immediately.

He had problems getting out but he was able to, in his pickup truck, and made it to our home (he has a key).

Despite a state of emergency, his employer wanted him to come in, so he's left for work now.

Before he left, he sent me a message on Facebook that he has heard that people had to enter his mobile home park in hovercrafts.  Right now we (and he) don't know what is happening with his trailer.

I told him to call his insurance agent.  I know that regular homeowners insurance doesn't cover flood but the little I know about mobile home insurance (my knowledge is about 30 years old!) he might have some coverage.  I don't know if he had a chance to.  He also told me that he is having issues with cell phone service.

We wouldn't even try to go home now, at least until the rain stops. We know the interstate we would normally use is closed now (about 20 miles from where we live). So we have to wait.  We know at least two major roads in our immediate home area are closed due to flooding.   We had major flood in 2006 and know what that was like.  Part of our neighborhood was evacuated.  We were lucky-that time.

And meanwhile, the woman who took the wildflower pictures I posted earlier today - well, I had an email from her when I got back to our motel room.  Her sister, who lives next door, is flooding. She left work early to help.  So here we go again.

No matter how old your children are, you worry.   I'm sure he isn't worried but I am worried for him!

So I will tell myself:  We are safe, and our son is safe, and right now that is all that matters.   I pray my friend and her sister are safe, too.   And all I can do is wait and see.

Will Binghamton Be a Championship Town Tonight?

So many setbacks....and the one time Binghamton gets into the national news it is due to a mass shooting in April of 2009.  (no, wait, another time-it was probably when we had major floods back in 2006.)

Or maybe a third time, the Binghamton Salt Babies tragedy of 1962.

Now we have something to celebrate - after tonight, the American Hockey League Binghamton Senators may be the winners of this year's Calder Cup.

Parties start everywhere around 7:15 pm.

Some people underestimate the power sports have to unite a population. But I saw that firsthand, years back, when I had the opportunity to live in Texas and Arkansas.  In both areas, high school football is a very powerful force.  Here, our "burnt out industrial town" needs all the good news we can get.  It needs a lot of unity. This event may provide it - even if we don't win.

Binghamton has never had a championship hockey team.  On certain streets in Binghamton, "Go B-Sen" signs have sprouted.  A certain local radio drive-time radio announcer (I heard this second hand from a fan this morning) expressed hopes that a certain building in downtown Binghamton, which has colored light displays on its upper floors and has been known to employ special event colors, might light up in red (B-Sen color) tonight.

If we win....tonight and tomorrow will be happy indeed.  And, perhaps we all will be wearing red.  Just in time for the temperatures to hit 95 degrees tomorrow, the B-Sen fans will heat up the town tonight.

The Wrath of Spring

Yesterday was one of those spring days that made you want to dance and sing, bask in the sunshine, run to the nearest nursery and buy tons of plants.

I knew it is supposed to be rainy and in the forties the rest of this week.  Well, maybe not all week. But I had to soak up that sunshine while it existed.  In the Southern Tier, the sunshine plays a shy, hide and seek game with us while it gives its bright favors to other parts of the country.

Spouse, seeing that Spring Madness had hit, walked around the yard with me as I took pictures of some of my flowers.  But the foot was put down about the nursery, that would have to wait for today.

So I contented myself with taking some pictures of flowers, and dreamed of nursery shopping.

Today, after our exercise walk on the Vestal Rail Trail, we headed for Tioga Gardens.  I love their tropical conservatory.  It is loaded with tropical plants (and open all year), and visiting with their rehab tropical birds is always a treat.  I can spend a lot of time there, and I always buy something (even if it's just an African Violet), so I restrict myself to visiting twice or three times a year.

This time I wanted to pick up some pansies and look at their started plants for after frost.

But this wasn't going to be the typical visit, as we learned very quickly.

As we slowed to make our turn in the parking lot, it was obvious that they had been flooded.

Several days of heavy rains caused our rivers to exit their banks earlier in the week.  It wasn't as extensive as our 2006 flood (That caused part of my neighborhood to be evacuated and caused lots of heartache overall.  We didn't have much damage but I know people in other areas who lost their homes and belongings.). But this flood brought to certain select areas something the Flood of 2006 hadn't as much-mud.   And Tioga Gardens was in one of the unfortunate areas.

Part of the tropical dome conservatory was roped off.  Piles of bagged topsoil and mulch were splattered with dried mud.  Muddy, dead plants were strewn about.  Part of the outdoor displays were roped off.  How much inventory had they lost?  A heartbreak for an established local business.  I doubt any of it was covered by insurance.  Their employees were working diligently, and they were open for business.  Still lots of inventory available for sale, so don't hesitate to come out and support a local business.

I hope the tropical birds are safe.

No, you won't see any pictures.  I learned from the Flood of 2006 that rubberneckers are not welcome in disaster neighborhoods; we aren't zoo animals to be stared at.  So out of respect, we bought our plants (ignoring the obvious reek of flood-if you have never smelled the reek of flood you are fortunate) and left.

Now back at home, spouse is working in the front yard.  Grateful that the flood wasn't as bad as it could have been.  It brings back too many bad memories.

But the rivers are still running high, and we are supposed to get more rain this week.

Rain Rain Go Away!

The northeast is about to get deluged in rain.  Seeing the red sky this morning (beautiful sunrise) made me wonder what was up.  You know the saying the sailors had....

Of course anyone living in Binghamton thinks back to the two floods of 2006.  I know several people who either lost houses, or property, or both. 
I can't imagine what they are thinking right now.

It will be an interesting (to say the least) next 24 hours.  Let's hope I can report on it tomorrow.

We Won an Orchard-thank you Edy's!

Thanks to Edy's Ice Cream, our local food pantry (CHOW) has won an orchard.  We ended up #1 in the voting.

The best part is....your community can do this, too, through this contest.

CHOW was going to purchase an orchard anyway, on land where houses used to stand until our 2006 floods.  Now they don't have to spend money on it, leaving other uses for the money.

Now CHOW's clients (in a few years anyway) will be able to enjoy fresh fruit.

Time for a ray of sunshine here in the cloudy Triple Cities.

Blue Angels and Flood Memories

Over the 4th of July weekend we are being treated to an airshow. This one features the Blue Angels. What a wonderful treat for our area.

It only seems like a few minutes ago, but it has been almost three years, since our Great Flood of June 28, 2006 caused so many disruptions, loss of property (I know two people who lost their homes and one who lost most of her belongings), and cancelled so many events in late June and early July of 2006. One of the events cancelled, if I recall correctly, was an air show.

There are two nice videos on YouTube that show the flood and its aftermath. I didn't see my neighborhood on either of them but parts of our neighborhood were evacuated - we personally were very lucky but if the river (we estimate) had been another foot higher it would have been a different story.

I hope we have much better weather for the Blue Angels.