Before I moved back to Blacksburg in 2016 to finish my Master's in landscape architecture with Virginia Tech, I worked for a small non-profit based out of Abingdon, VA (2 hours south of Blacksburg near Bristol, VA/TN). During that time I worked on a 19-county, 4-city regional initiative that leveraged outdoor recreation and natural assets for community and economic development in low-to-moderate income communities. It was during that time that I first started to spend time on the Clinch River, most intensively in Cleveland, VA.
I worked for this non-profit for between 2013 and 2016. During that time I would visit Cleveland about once every week to work with community leaders to develop numerous projects or check on ones that were already under way. As I began thinking about this assignment, one particular storm event stood out in my memory.
On all accounts, it was a normal week, until March 5, 2015. The normalcy quickly vanished as changed as a flood warnings rippled through the region. And then the rains came. And came. And came. I remember visiting Cleveland the following week to see how residents' house faired. There is a certain section of housing that is between the railroad and the river, an immediate concern during high-water events. I was also interested a cluster of dilapidated buildings within the former downtown area that were slated for demolition. I could only imagine the environmental risk these buildings posed since nearly all of them contained a smorgasbord of contaminants, including asbestos and lead-based paint. Additionally, there was concern that if (portions) of the buildings were swept downstream they might compromise the only bridge in town to get from one side of the river to the other.
The storm of March 5, 2015 was certainly one for the record books. Visiting the community afterwards, people shared stories of the plenty of the river rising fast and with vigor. Some community members shared colorful stories of them seeing the water nearly touching the bridge. Thinking to myself, I realized that must have been at least 20'.
Looking at the NOAA records, it was in fact a record setting crest. The total rise recorded at the Cleveland gauge station was 18.7 ft.
For curiosity sake, I decided to see what impacts could be seen downstream. To no surprise, the records continued. The next gauge station on the Clinch River downstream is in Speers Ferry. There the March 5th flood set an all-time record, coming in as the 8th highest flood event.
The rise difference between the two gauge stations was +10' over the span of approximately 60 river miles. How incredible. This makes sense as river corridors and watersheds tend to expand as they go downstream.
Here is a short video taken in the Cleveland area that captures the extent of the flooding.
Finally, the damage of this this particular flooding event could have been worse. Looking through news articles I did not come across any substantial damage. I did, however, come across an article out of Tennessee that credits the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) network of dams for minimizing the potential for flood damage downstream. There is a brief mention of the 2015 flood event, where TVA estimates that nearly $130 million worth of damages was avoided thanks to their dam system. More on that article can be found here.
The sheer power of water can certainly be humbling sometimes, as was in my observations of the March 5, 2015 flood event within the Clinch River watershed in Virginia. I am thankful that modern technology, such as dams, minimized the overall impact and the river communities survived to tell the tale of the next great flood.
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