St. George • Even as the water from the melting snowpack in southwest Utah continues raging down the Virgin and Santa Clara rivers, leaders and first responders in Washington County are reveling in the fact that there has been no major flooding.
“We have seen some higher levels on the river but nothing close to flood stage, and we don’t anticipate any [flooding] this week,” said Jason Bradley, Washington County emergency operations manager.”
County and municipal officials in southwestern Utah attribute the lack of major flooding to the millions of dollars that have been spent on shoring up the banks of the Virgin and Santa Clara rivers with armor and removing sandbars and other potential blockages that could trigger flooding.
Others chalk up the St. George area’s good fortune to the weather, with its alternating warm and cool days that have kept flows from mountain snows coming down in manageable amounts. Whether the area’s good fortune is due to flood preparation or the fickle weather gods, St. George resident Lucy Jimenez is grateful.
“With all the rain we got this spring I thought we were in for big trouble,” she said. “The fact that there have been so few problems is a blessing.”
Jordan Clayton, supervisor of the Utah Snow Survey, won’t weigh on which factor has been more important in preventing flooding, but he can confirm that the bulk of the near-record snowpack that was in southwest Utah’s mountains has already melted and the balance should come down soon.
Of the near-record 28.6 inches of snow-water equivalent that existed in southwest Utah’s mountains in mid-April, Clayton said, that total has now dropped to about 6.3 inches of snow-water equivalent, about a 78% reduction.
“That’s well below the proportion of snowpack levels in the northern half of the state, where the [remaining] snowpack is closer to 45%,” Clayton said, adding those totals are being driven by even higher levels in northern Utah.
While flood concerns have abated, worries over public safety continue. Especially concerning is the number of people recreating in or near the area’s rivers.
“We have people playing out on the river and doing things they shouldn’t be doing …,” Santa Clara Mayor Rick Rosenberg told the Tribune recently. “I was out on the Santa Clara [River] the other day and saw some young kids, probably 8 or 10 years old, walking right up to the edge.”
Sgt. Darrell Cashin, liaison with Washington County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue, concurs with Rosenberg. His search and rescue teams have responded to several emergencies to help fish people out of fast-flowing rivers.
In late April, Cashin said, search and rescue teams from Washington County and Zion National Park were conducting swift-water rescue training in the national park when they responded to a report of a Canadian tourist falling into the Virgin River and being swept downstream.
When teams located the 25-year-old woman, she did not have a pulse. After administering CPR, first responders were able to revive and transport her to a nearby helicopter landing zone, where she was airlifted to the hospital.
County search and rescue and St. George first responders also teamed up twice over the past month to help people trapped in the Virgin River. One of them involved a father and his two boys who were in a small rubber boat and got stuck in a hydraulic, a river feature where water falls over a rock or other obstruction and causes surface water to be drawn back toward the obstruction.
By the time first responders arrived, the father had swam to shore with one of the boys and shortly thereafter was able to retrieve his other son and bring him ashore. The same day, county rescuers and St. George firefighters responded to an emergency involving two teens who were trapped atop a debris pile in the Virgin River. Cashin said rescuers were able to throw the boys a rope and tow them to safety.
Cashin said too many thrill-seekers underestimate the power of water, even if it is only a few inches deep.
“If the water is running hard, it doesn’t take much to [sweep] you off your feet,” he said.
With the spring runoff season in southwest Utah nearly behind them, St. George-area search and rescue teams’ focus is increasingly on the future — the arrival of the summer monsoon season in July.
“Then we have a whole ‘nother set of problems to worry about,” Cashin said.
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