Mason County is a mess

[spinninbug]

Hope no one is planning on fishing Hamlin for a while,  you can't get to the launch at Wilson Hill anymore,  the roads are gone!  US 31 north from Scottville to Manistee is closed!  We are under a state of emergency.  My 23 mile trek to work just became 80.  I have to go almost to Baldwin to get home.  I should have just stayed home today.  There are so many roads washed away,  homes destroyed, garages.  Manistee didn't get as much water as mason did but they have trees down on every street in the city,  accross homes,  garages, cars you name it.  It's a real mess here. 

They are worried about the darn on Hamlin and have evacuated the state park.  The water level is up over 2 feet. There were boats that came undone and went to the darn,  they used a front end loader and chains to get them away from the darn. A friend lives on the lake and sent me pictures of the south bayou,  unbielvable.  You can't even tell there was a boat launch there. 

Right in ludington there is a street gone,  sewer lines broke and are running into PM Lake.  A family was rescued with boats on first street,  there was 5 feet of water in the road.

We are going to be digging out from this for a while.

If you would like to check it out there are pictures and video's at
www.ludingtondailynews.com

It's not pretty. 

[djkimmel]

We had a tornado maybe go down the river right in Lansing knocking down a lot of big trees and it twisted the Board of Water & Light cooling tower into a ball of aluminum foil. But nothing that bad like you describe in town. Be careful.

[Durand Dan]

And to think people believe that that earth is going though climate changes due to man's intervention with the environment.

[TritonTR20]

I'm planning on being there the 25,26,27 of July. Hopfully it will be back to normal by then!

[Dan]

My cabin was in the eye of the storm as well. I'm pretty much due east 30 miles of where the storm made landfall. So far no news is good news. No one has called me saying the cabin is gone.
When I left from staying up there the night after the Burt BFL the lake was at the top of my dock and I am sure it's floating by now. I plan on goin up tomorrow and may have to chain saw my way in. I'm a mile in from the asphalt.

[Firefighter Jeff]

Hey Wendy,

      I had such a whirlwind weekend I kinda forgot about ya    Sorry  !!!  Anyway, this is why.  Hamlin Sports center didn't get to my boat before we took off, so I left it there.  Well, they had it ready, and I didn't get asked for overtime on Sat the 14th so I headed up on Friday!

      I had gotten an email from a guy that was supposed to go to the Middle Bayou for a weeks vacation.  He told me of all the rains and said the resort cancelled their vacation because of the flooding.  He said I should call ahead.  Well, I figured I could still get my boat, besides if I didn't go I couldn't get it til July 2nd.

      Well, on the way up I hear they closed the State Park and Shelley got on the LDN website and tells me of the washed out roads.  All I can say is unbelievable  !!!!!!  Over and over I said that.  lolol  I took 165 pictures from 3 in the afternoon til dark.  lololol  Mostly of the damage from the South Bayou to the North Bayou.  Some on Duneview, my uncle's cottage and Lincoln rd..  Some at the Lincoln river at lakeshore Dr.

     I was worried they might close Lakeshore between south and middle Bayous, so I got my boat from the marina and stayed in town for the night.  I wasn't sure if Hamlin was going to keep rising or not.  All kinds of rumors were flying.  lolol

    I ended up leaving town at 9:30 am and headed home.  Ummmm saw a stinkin doe eating grass 2 feet from the shoulder just outside of town !!!!  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr  lolol    I stuck the boat in the garage and headed to Indy where the girls were staying for a soccer tourney.  Got home last night about 7pm.

     Hopefully you didn't suffer too much damage to your homestead.  I wonder how much they will get repaired before we head back up July 13th.
Let me know if you want me to forward some emails with pics that I took up there.  I've checked out the LDN myself, cool videos and pics !!!

                         Jeff
                   

[spinninbug]

Well things are slowly starting to get back to normal.  US 31 isn't open yet.  They got the sewer line fixed but all beaches are closed,  and all boat ramps too.  The bacteria is bad,  maybe they will open them at the end of the week,  it will be a while before I go to pm lake fishing.  They are saying we lost an entire year of trout, steelhead and browns in the rivers,  they are hoping that we didn't loose all the gravel these fish use for beds for next year.

The state park just opened back up last night,  even though the water is still almost 2 feet higher than normal.  They believe the darn is fine and it's working properly.

People have lost alot in ludington,  and most don't have flood coverage so insurance won't cover.  It kind of give you a feel of what other states (like Katrina only not that bad) have gone through.  It's sad.

The lakes are just unbelievable.  Docks are under water,  so you can't flip them.  I think the fish are confused!!  We had a tournament over in irons this last weekend and the bite was just off. 

Jeff I thought about you and your place wondered if your trailer survived.  I would love to see those pictures.  You can email them to me if you get time.   Hopefully this will be pretty much cleaned up when you come back up.  It's going to be interesting to see what happens with the 4th coming.  Wonder what it's going to be like down at the beach for the fire works. 

We were lucky,  just a little water damage from a skylite. We didn't loose any trees or anything.  Couldn't get from my house to town the the road was out.   I knew it would be when I drove through it on friday. 

As of yesterday there were still people that didn't have their phones yet.  Alot of work to get everything back to normal.

[Firefighter Jeff]

Hey Wendy,

     Shoot me an email at jsreg23@aol.com so I can forward the pics to you.  We made out just fine, we are one of the furthest trailers from the water and it sits up pretty high.  I figured we were fine. 

                            Jeff