Heavy rain moving across parts of Minnesota

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Floodwaters that rose as swiftly as 8
feet an hour tore through a campground packed with vacationing
families early Friday, carrying away tents and overturning RVs as
campers slept. At least 16 people were killed, and dozens more
missing and feared dead.

      Heavy rains caused the normally quiet Caddo and Little Missouri
rivers to climb out of their banks during the night. Around dawn,
floodwaters barreled into the Albert Pike Recreation Area, a
54-unit campground in the Ouachita National Forest that was packed
with vacationing families.

      The raging torrent poured through the valley with such force
that it peeled asphalt off roads and bark off trees. Cabins dotting
the river banks were severely damaged. Mobile homes lay on their
sides.


      Two dozen people were hospitalized. Authorities rescued 60
others.


      Marc and Stacy McNeil of Marshall, Texas, survived by pulling
their pickup truck between two trees and standing in the bed in
waist-deep water.


      "It was just like a boat tied to a tree," Marc McNeil said,
describing how the truck bobbed up and down.
      


They were on their first night of camping with a group of seven,
staying in tents. The rain kept falling, and the water kept rising
throughout the night, at one point topping the tool box in the back
of the truck.
     


 "We huddled together, and prayed like we'd never prayed
before." Stacy McNeil said. They were able to walk to safety once
the rain stopped.

      After the water receded, anguished relatives pleaded with
emergency workers for help finding more than 40 missing loved ones.
     

 At one point, Gov. Mike Beebe said the death had climbed to 20.
But Beebe's office later revised that figure to 16, saying he had
relied on an erroneous figure after talking to an emergency worker
at the scene.


      Still, authorities agreed that the death toll could easily rise.
Forecasters warned of the approaching danger during the night, but
campers could easily have missed those advisories because the area
is isolated.

      "There's not a lot of way to get warning to a place where
there's virtually no communication," Beebe said. "Right now we're
just trying to find anybody that is still capable of being
rescued."


      The governor said damage at the campground was comparable to
that caused by a strong tornado. The force of the water carried one
body 8 miles downstream.


      While the governor spoke, rescuers in canoes and kayaks were on
the Little Missouri looking for bodies and survivors who might
still be stranded. Crews were initially delayed in their search
because a rock slide blocked a road leading to the campsites.

      "As that river goes down, you don't know how many people are
under it," the governor said.


      Authorities prepared for a long effort to find other corpses
that may have been washed away.

      "This is not a one- or two-day thing," said Gary Fox, a
retired emergency medical technician who was helping identify the
dead and compile lists of those who were unaccounted for.

      "This is going to be a week or two- or three-week recovery."

      The heavily wooded region offers a mix of campgrounds, hunting
grounds and private homes. Wilderness buffs can stay at sites with
modern facilities or hike and camp off the beaten path.

      Forest Service spokesman John Nichols said it would have been
impossible to warn everyone that the flood was coming. The area has
spotty cell phone service and no sirens.

      "If there had been a way to know this type of event was
occurring, it'd be closed period," Nichols said.
    

  A trooper on duty noticed high water about 3 a.m. and notified
the sheriff's department, which responded to the scene.

      He said the water is usually low, allowing people to wade and
fish in it during the summer, Nichols said.
      


Brigette Williams, spokeswoman for the American Red Cross in
Little Rock, estimated that up to 300 people were in the area when
the floods swept through.

      "There's no way to know who was in there last night," state
police spokesman Bill Sadler said. It would be difficult to signal
for help because of the rugged and remote nature of the area being
searched, some 75 miles west of Little Rock.
    


  The Arkansas Department of Emergency Management sent satellite
phones and specialized radio equipment to help in the rescue
effort.

      Campground visitors are required to sign a log as they take a
site, but the registry was carried away by the floodwaters.

      Wanda McRae Nooner, whose son and daughter-in-law have a home
and a cabin along the river, said her son was helping rescuers.

      "I know they've been bringing the bodies up there in front of
their house until they can get ambulances in and out. It's just the
most horrible thing. It's almost unbelievable."
      


The rough terrain likely kept some campers from reaching safety,
according to Tabitha Clarke, a hydrologist with the National
Weather Service office in North Little Rock.
      


Some parts of the valley are so steep and craggy that the only
way out is to hike downstream. Any hikers who had taken cars to the
campsites would have been blocked at low-water bridge crossings
that are inundated when the rivers rise, she said.
    


  The National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning around
2 a.m. after the slow-moving storm dumped heavy rain on the area.
At that point, a gauge at nearby Langley showed the Little Missouri
River was less than 4 feet deep. But as the rain rolled down the
steep hillsides, it built up volume and speed.
     


 Even if people attempted to leave at the first sign of danger,
water climbing higher and higher along the valley walls may already
have inundated a number of low-water crossings, trapping them,
Clarke said.

      Authorities established a command post near the post office in
Langley, along the Little Missouri. Helicopters landed behind a
general store, and a triage unit was set up at a volunteer fire
department.

      Meliea Moore of Hot Springs waited at the store with her friend
whose sister, brother-in-law and niece were among the missing. They
had been staying in a cabin for the past week at the campground.

      A center for relatives of the missing was set up at a church in
Lodi offering dry clothes and food.

Gallery

Floodwaters that rose as swiftly as 8
feet an hour rushed into a remote Arkansas valley early Friday,
killing at least 16 people, many of them campers who became trapped
by a devastating wall of water. Dozens more were missing and feared
dead.

Arkansas flash floods kill at least 16 people

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