Mayor, Mitchell city officials closely monitoring Dry Run Creek water levels as flood forces evacuations

Jun. 21—MITCHELL — Dry Run Creek resembled a lake on Friday, June 21, as stormwater from a record rainfall event on Thursday caused water levels in the creek to drastically rise.

The record rain storm that drenched Mitchell with just under 5 inches of rain on Thursday prompted city officials to ask some residents living along Dry Run Creek to evacuate their homes Friday morning.

Mayor Bob Everson said the Mitchell Recreation Center is being set up to provide temporary shelter for the evacuated residents. The shelter at the Rec Center is anticipated to be fully operational by 4 p.m.

"We had to evacuate some areas along Dry Run Creek, including a trailer park," Everson said. "The Rec Center is being used as an emergency shelter by the Red Cross. People displaced from their homes can go seek shelter at the Rec Center."

The creek serves as a main stormwater drainage artery for Mitchell. After Thursday's storm drenched Mitchell, Dry Run Creek was being inundated with stormwater throughout Friday.

"This was a lot of rain in a very short time. I hate to see this happen, especially in my final few weeks," said Everson, who has about two weeks remaining before his second mayoral term comes to a close.

Everson is no stranger to a historic flood. The 2019 flood that dropped 8 to 10 inches of rain on Mitchell in a two-day span hit the city during Everson's second year in office.

From what Everson has observed, he said the latest storm mirrored the 2019 flood.

According to the National Weather Service, Mitchell received a total of 4.87 inches of rain Thursday. That breaks the daily rainfall record for Mitchell set in 1984, when 2.90 inches of rain fell. That total does not include overnight rainfall amounts that persisted into the early morning hours on Friday.

Several unofficial reports had rain totals hovering around 8 inches, as of Friday afternoon.

As water levels in Dry Run Creek rapidly rose to dangerous levels on Friday, city officials blocked off traffic on Burr Street where a bridge sits atop Dry Run Creek near the skate park. A portion of Minnesota Street where a bridge runs atop the creek was also closed off to traffic. The creek was inches away from submerging both bridges Friday evening.

City Council member Tim Goldammer represents many of the residents in Ward 1 who were evacuated from their homes along the Dry Run Creek area.

The major flooding wreaking havoc on homes in the west side of Mitchell near Dry Run Creek has Goldammer ready to dive deeper into the issues the area frequently experiences during heavy rain events.

"Dry Run Creek is a major problem we will have to do something with at some point," Goldammer said. "We need this water to go south, and it appears to be heading north. This is the second time in the last five years that several Dry Run Creek areas have flooded to the point of evacuating people."

Learning from the 2019 flood, City Administrator Stephanie Ellwein said Dry Run Creek typically begins filling more rapidly a few hours after heavy rains.

"Just like that last flood we had in 2019, we know that it didn't really peak here in town between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. So we are anticipating that Dry Run Creek is going to continue going up," Ellwein said.

As multiple homes had flooded basements, many residents' sump pumps were working in overdrive. Although the rain had let up Friday morning, Dry Run Creek continued rising as more residents discharged basement water that ultimately winds up in the city's already stressed sewer system.

Christie Gunkel owns multiple rental properties in Mitchell with basements that were flooded Thursday night.

"We had one rental with a wall in the basement fall in. We had another rental that had water so high a tenant had to climb out of the window because the water was so high surrounding the house," Gunkel said.

When the 2019 flood left standing water in many basements, Ellwein offered a helpful tip she learned to reduce a collapsed basement wall.

"One thing I learned was if someone has a lot of water in their basement, they have to be careful with how fast they remove the water. You need to do it slowly so you don't end up with basement wall problems," Ellwein said.