State highway officials estimate it will take about 24 hours for the water to drain from behind the dike. It will take at least another 24 hours for workers to inspect the freeway and clear it of debris and a nasty, slimy coating so it can be opened to traffic.
It only took about 20 minutes and a few dozen scoops for a track-mounted excavator to chew a hole into the clay levee and begin the process of draining floodwater from the airport and surrounding commercial district, but the 10 preceding hours were far more difficult and frustrating for state, county and city officials.
Stories told last night differ slightly, but state officials were clearly frustrated by what they saw as a hand-wringing, go-slow local approach. In a press release distributed statewide, the states top highway official described delays and hours of discussion by city and county officials who refused to allow crews to access the dike.
Lewis County officials, however, say they werent willing to risk lawsuits just to open I-5 a little sooner, and say the state had already publicly committed to breaching the dike on television before mentioning their plans to the locals who owned it.
Im concerned, people are flooded out there, you dump a few million more gallons, they aint gonna be happy about it County Commissioner Richard Graham told The Chronicle last night. The DOT made the breach, they can take the heat from angry people downstream, Graham said.
Slow, Then Fast
Don Wagner, the regional Washington State Department of Transportation Administrator for Southwest Washington, said he was ready to breach the dike at 10 a.m. Wednesday.
As he describes it, locals initially said they would use county equipment to breach the dike in the same place they did it in 1996, on a low spot at the curving southeast end of the dike, when a similar deluge also overtopped the levee and had nowhere to drain.
County officials were indecisive over several hours as their concerns about liability, ownership of the property and responsibility for adding to flooding grew, Wagner said.
I could not believe what was happening … First I had to pinch myself to believe I wasnt in a nightmare, Wagner said.
The first change of heart came when Lewis County people told him local workers wouldnt do the actual dike breaching but that state workers could use county equipment. Then word came down that county equipment couldnt be used, but that the state DOT could use its own equipment to break into the dike. WSDOT went so far as to rent equipment from the Adna area and bring it to the dike by the time the county said it needed more discussion about whether the county, the cities of Centralia and Chehalis or a combination actually owned the specific part of the dike that was to be breached.
We had a backhoe out there ready to dig. We had to put the brakes on, he said.
Wagner said that by 3 p.m. he was so frustrated he suggested breaching the dike in state-owned right-of-way a few dozen yards from I-5. Its on higher ground, making it less ideal for draining the entire reservoir and creating the possibility that the rush of outgoing water could damage the interstate, but he said something had to be done.
Within a half hour, the state decided to go ahead with the breach in that location, Wagner said.
He estimates the extended discussion - which he worried could have gone on for days - ended up delaying the dike breach, and the eventual reopening of I-5, by 10 hours. The DOT has said this week that every day of I-5 closure costs the economy $4 million dollars.
County Perspective
Lewis County Prosecutor Michael Golden said the state could have come in with an emergency declaration in hand and simply started digging. But instead, they came and asked the county for permission, which to Golden meant finding out who exactly owned that piece of the dike and letting the county commission or city council involved give approval.
After decades of joint ownership and land transfers, bits of dike are owned by a confusing hodgepodge of Lewis County, Chehalis and Centralia ownership - sometimes two or three entities at once. At first, the DOT couldnt identify the precise legal description of the spot it wanted to breach.
All I know was that it has still not crested downstream and we would be adding to that flow, Golden said last night, and thats a concern the board of county commissioners and the city council had not had a chance to address and something I believe they had a right to address.
The county prosecutor said he got nervous when state workers told him that it was possible that once a chunk of the dike was taken out, the entire section could give way, causing a massive flow of new water onto unsuspecting downstream residents.
Golden said he and Chehalis City Attorney Bill Hillier believe the eventual outcome of the DOT breaching the dike on its own property is in the best interests of all involved.
DOTs concern is with Interstate 5 only, he said. Local elected officials, however, are concerned about local citizens and property, and that includes not incurring blind liability and potentially causing problems for people downstream.
Satisfied at Last
Wagner said his boss, Gov. Christine Gregoire, told him in no uncertain terms she wanted the water off the freeway. Wagner said because flooding for many miles downstream had already receded by about eight feet, he was willing to risk adding a little more water for the benefit of getting I-5 open sooner.
Most of the area wont even notice this water is coming out, Wagner said. Its not adding to the flooding.
Brian Mittge, assistant editor of The Chronicle, welcomes comments and news tips via bmittge@chronline.com or 360-807-8234.
