I live just outside of Columbia South Carolina. It is a wonderful place to live and work. Slow, laid back, peaceful, friendly, relatively small. I’m a transplant and I’ve been living here a bit over 3 years now. Long enough to be acquainted with the area.
This weekend has been a bit surreal as we planned for Joaquin to “enhance” the weather above our heads. Through Friday I hadn’t really given it much thought and even over most of Saturday I didn’t think much about it. If the Clemson/Notre Dame football game could go on what is the big deal? Joaquin was not actually making landfall so it was just going to be rain. Lots of it to be sure but it was just rain.
The rain came down heavy and steady. It never felt as if it was a downpour. The winds occasionally whipped but nothing threatening. But the heavy rain never stopped. It simply kept raining.
Columbia is surrounded by 3 rivers and there is generally a lot of water around to begin with. Add in 18 inches of rain in a 20 to 48 hour stretch everywhere (it is actually still raining but not quite as bad) and suddenly water levels rise. Levels rise slowly at first as the water spreads out. Then it begins quicken. Water starts to pool up on surfaces because drains have no where to take it. Water begins to flow as it seeks somewhere new to go. Still the water levels rise.
In downtown Columbia there are buildings that have been taken down. Across the entire city there are stretches of road that no longer exists. Water is the most powerful force in nature for a reason. It goes where we can’t see. It finds faults that we didn’t know existed. It tears down from below and the inside. When it has no where to go below it covers above as well. There are places where you can only just make out the tops of cars above the surface of the water.
My wife and I are lucky. Where we are at (about 15 minutes from the center of the city) didn’t see nearly the amount of damage but several of our neighbors yards were completely flooded, the power stayed on and we still have water. Others have been far less fortunate.
Keep the city in your thoughts and prayers. They are calling it a 1,000 year flood event. Even that doesn’t put it in perspective correctly.