Floodwaters from Yellowstone surge through eastern Montana
BILLINGS, Mont. – Montana’s largest city restarted its water plant Thursday after shutting it down amid record flooding that’s caused widespread damage in Yellowstone National Park and surrounding communities.
Residents in ravaged areas, meanwhile, cleaned up from the mess and braced for the economic fallout while the park remains closed at the height of tourist season. Billings had asked residents to conserve water because it was down to a limited supply when the Yellowstone River hit record high levels and triggered the closure of the treatment plant.
“We are aware yesterday’s alert to the community caused a panic. That was never our hope,” city officials said in a statement Thursday. “We have never witnessed a situation like the one we saw yesterday ... we did not know how bad it could get or how long it would continue.”
The floodwaters continued to move downstream. By this morning, the flooding was expected to reach Miles City in eastern Montana. Local authorities said low-lying areas along the river could be flooded but there was no immediate risk to the city of more than 8,000 people.
Officials asked Billings residents Wednesday to conserve water because it was down to a 24- to 36-hour supply after a combination of heavy rain and rapidly melting mountain snow raised the Yellowstone River to historic levels that forced them to shut down its water treatment plant.
“None of us planned a 500-year flood event on the Yellowstone when we designed these facilities,” said Debi Meling, the public works director.
The city stopped watering parks and boulevards, and its fire department filled trucks with river water. Normal operations resumed Thursday after the river level began to drop. It crested Wednesday at over a foot above the previous recorded high in Billings in 1997.
The unprecedented and sudden flooding this week drove all but a dozen of the more than 10,000 visitors out of the nation’s oldest national park.
Remarkably, no one was reported hurt or killed by raging waters that pulled homes off their foundations and pushed a river off course – possibly permanently – and may require damaged roads to be rebuilt a safer distance away.
Yellowstone officials are hopeful that next week they can reopen the southern half of the park, which includes Old Faithful geyser.
Park officials say the northern half of the park is likely to remain closed all summer.