Duluth's great flood of 2012

Chester Creek rushes over a pedestrian bridge in the park.

My family hunkered indoors Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, listening to the thunder and downpours of rain, counting seconds after lightning strikes. We continually monitored the radar, as well as news and community blog postings of the havoc and destruction the storm was wreaking. Once in a while we checked on the small trickles or streams, depending on the severity of the rainfall at the moment, running in from various points in our basement.

My son was engrossed by the images of high water rushing over rocks we had rested upon during a hike last week in Chester Park, water surrounding the Target store, cars in sinkholes, and the tales of seals and a polar bear escaping from their enclosures at the zoo. (One seal was found on Grand Avenue.) He was saddened by reports of the barnyard animals' drowning.

By 1 p.m., I put on my rain boots (Sam's are too small, again), and we headed out into our neighborhood to view the storm damage. "He's going to be telling stories about this one to his children," our mailwoman predicted, as we encountered her on the street.

We witnessed the raging brown waters of Chester Creek from atop the Ninth Street Bridge (after road workers had checked its structural integrity and reopened it). We walked along Chester Park Drive, observing from above the road washouts and mudslides that carried large trees from the upper woods, across the hiking trail and almost down to the creek. We washed the bottoms of our muddy boots and tennis shoes in the small but steady runoff coming down our alley.

Today, in honor of Duluth's great flood of 2012, my son and I read the chapter from Winnie the Pooh, "In Which Piglet is Entirely Surrounded by Water."