Sunday night rain wreaks more havocResidents near Rock Creek still reeling from last week’s deluge, evacuationsWednesday, July 5, 2006
‘‘There was a good amount of damage in the Aspen Hill area,” county Fire and Rescue Services spokeswoman Dorcus ‘‘Dee” Howard Richards said. ‘‘Some of those affected were already attempting to recover from last week’s evacuation efforts.” And that has left many residents wondering whether summer rains will continue to force them to leave their homes. Work continues on the Lake Needwood Dam as county officials prepare to determine long-term solutions to maintain the structure. The reservoir reached a peak of 23 feet above normal levels around June 27, said Mike Riley, park development chief for the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission. It dropped to 10 feet above normal by Monday, he said. ‘‘The effects of last night’s rainfall are insignificant,” Riley said Monday. All conditions at the dam are improving, he said Monday afternoon. It is still leaking, but at a much slower rate, he added. After a few days of heavy rain early last week, the earthen dam that separates the lake from Rock Creek began leaking in several places. That, coupled with the lake swelling to almost two dozen feet above its normal level, prompted the county to evacuate hundreds of families in the Aspen Hill area in the early-morning hours of June 28. Later that day, residents in Kensington and Bethesda were asked to evacuate. Tensions eased on Thursday when levels in the nine monitoring wells located on the face of the dam, on the downstream slope, began dropping that evening. ‘‘[That] gave us the final comfort level that the dam was stable,” Riley said. County officials lifted the area evacuation by 10 o’clock that night. Before a solution is determined, considerable engineering studies and review by the appropriate agencies must be completed, Riley said. Historical records must be reviewed and various forms of testing need to be done, he added. ‘‘That’s going to take several weeks,” he said. ‘‘Right now no one knows what the fix is.” Hurricane Agnes in 1972 was the only event that ever produced water levels higher than those on Tuesday, Riley said. No leakage was reported at the dam during Hurricane Isabel in 2003, he said. The dam was built in 1965. Agnes showered less than two inches of precipitation in the Rockville area, and Isabel dropped almost 11 inches, according to reports from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration A dam is designed and built to hold reservoir elevations expected for its area, said Mike Stello, a geotechnical engineer with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. ‘‘All dams leak,” he said. ‘‘As long as the leak is controlled, it’s not a problem.” ‘‘The engineers on site have determined that dam is still structurally sound,” said Chuck Gates, spokesman for the Maryland Department of the Environment. ‘‘At this point we’re not concerned with the prospect of other storms.” The dam, and the evacuees At some point toward the middle of last week, several small holes appeared in the dam and water began to trickle out. Concerned about a wave of floodwater breaking through to the Twinbrook and Aspen Hill communities downstream, county officials began evacuating residents. A convoy of earthmovers carted sandbags and gravel to the damaged area on June 28. Workers covered the trouble spots with the material, trying to add more weight in the hopes it would inhibit additional leakage. ‘‘The good news is that [the leaking water] is clear, meaning it isn’t washing soil away from the dam,” Riley said. ‘‘The bad news is that it’s not decreasing, either.” The leaks could either have been the result of water running through native rocks along the side of the dam or a channel that developed beneath the dam soil itself, he said. Evidence of the high water was easy to spot, as an overflow area normally used for parking and other park buildings was flooded. Downstream, hundreds of people were evacuated from the Rock Creek Terrace Apartments on Veirs Mill Road and other nearby streets. People woke up to police banging on their doors as early as 2 a.m. informing them about the evacuation. They only had a few minutes to dress and grab some items — pillows, blankets, medicine and important documents — before heading to the shelter either by car or on buses, evacuees said. About 2,230 people were evacuated June 28 and welcomed at three shelters. Some chose to seek refuge with family and friends or at hotels. The majority of early-morning evacuees from Aspen Hill went to Wheaton High School, where 450 people registered with the American Red Cross as they arrived, said Jessica Adams of the Red Cross. By that afternoon, about 200 people remained at the shelter, as many left to go to work or elsewhere. At least 100 people stayed at home. A second round of evacuations took place late in the afternoon of June 28 when residents in homes along several blocks of Parkwood Drive in Bethesda and Kensington were asked to leave. On some blocks, only one side of the street — the side that borders Rock Creek — was evacuated. Some praised the county’s decision to evacuate. It’s good that the county didn’t take any risks and evacuated people before there was a problem, said Yohannes Wabreha of Rockville, who was at the shelter with his wife and three children. Help came too late in New Orleans, he said. Although a sign informed people to tell volunteers about any special needs or diets, it was a message that an older Korean couple missed. They did not speak English, and Christine ‘‘Tina” Clarke from County Executive Douglas M. Duncan’s office worked to locate a translator who could communicate the couple’s needs. ‘‘He just didn’t look well,” Clarke said about the husband. She discovered he was recovering from a stroke and could not eat solid foods. She was able to get his wife on the phone with a translator while a volunteer was sent to get food he could eat. County staff encountered people with other health conditions like diabetes and asthma, and people who needed wheelchairs, said Kay Aaby from the Department of Public Health. Some did not have their medication, Aaby said, and staff tried to find them what they needed. By the afternoon, snacks, drinks and diapers from the Wheaton Giant grocery store came in. The Salvation Army also donated lunch, Adams said. It was a different story for those who did not move to the shelter. Edwin Fugel, 76, said he spent the night in his car. which he drove to Wheaton Woods Elementary School. ‘‘It’s not a big deal,” he said stoically. ‘‘When you can’t do anything about Mother Nature, what are you going to do?” Park Police knocked on Vicki Johnson’s door around 2 a.m., she said, telling her to collect any medication and leave within five minutes. ‘‘Five minutes,” she said, standing outside her home at noon. ‘‘It was scary. In 10 minutes we were at the local Dunkin’ Donuts getting ourselves a cup of java.” Johnson and her family later came back, got their camper and spent the remainder of the night sleeping in the parking lot of the Melvin J. Berman Hebrew Academy. By 10 a.m. she was back home, anxiously watching the sunny skies for more rain. ‘‘I’m not unhooking the camper (from the truck), I can tell you that,” she said.
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