Flood waters in mid Michigan

[Kenneth Wuepper]

How is the theater in Beaverton? We have not heard from you in some time and hope that your building is safe from the flood.

Midland is experiencing lots of water in the downtown business district where the water is at a historic depth.

The Vassar theater is also in the flood plane and nothing has been seen of them lately either.

The Temple in downtown Saginaw, Michigan has been sand bagged in anticipation of major flooding as the water from the two dams reaches the Saginaw River.

These are very trying times, indeed.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

Its mostly Midland and Sanford. I have relatives that live in in Midland. Er did....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SF0c1eyuiJs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8wDdN_GNi0

[Kenneth Wuepper]

Hello Mark,

Sorry for the folks in Midland that have lost their homes. We live in Saginaw township and are above the 500 year flood plane. The green doughnut in the pictures is the farmers market. The Bavarian building is the City Hall.

The Wyrembelski theatre is in the flood area as is the Vassar.

Thanks for the links. There are 2 dams that have failed. One drained a lake and the second one is down stream and it also failed. One bridge has been wiped out and several properties along the Tittabawassee River are also lost.

We are waiting to see how the Saginaw River acts as it is where all of this water is headed. The Temple Theatre is very close to the river and was flooded in the 1929 flood. The organ console was down in the pit so it got wet on the very bottom. Took out the lift motor and the master control cable to the relay.

We raised the console to the top of the lift and switched off the power to the motor. The master cable is now telco plenum rates so it should weather the water if it comes.

[Richard Coleman]

The owner of the Gem Theatre in Beaverton was asked on another forum if he was doing ok. This was his response 2 days ago:

Thanks for asking. We are alright. The dam here in Beaverton is actually directly behind the theater and our office building. Our dam was never in question and handled things well. Our lake (Ross) is fine as well. However, Wixom lake is considered apart of the Beaverton area and it's completely gone. No telling what will come of this.

It will be interesting to see the entire outcome as Midland has not yet seen the height of the waters, and Saginaw/Bay City will be next. As far as Sanford, you might as well remove it off the map. It's been quite a sight. Never would have imagined seeing 5 dam failures simultaneously happening. Ours was the only one that managed the load without entering failure territory.

Many of our customers either reside or have seasonal homes on Wixom lake. Combine that with this covid business it will be interesting to see how this economically impacts Gladwin County as a whole. I should add that hopefully quite soon we can return to "normal". I think having the theater here will hopefully be able to provide some joy and escape for everyone in the area. Morale is taking quite the beating.

[Kenneth Wuepper]

Hello Richard,

Thank you for that wonderful news.
The Midland Center for the Arts has suffered unknown damage as they received flood water.
We are still waiting for the Saginaw River to crest. It is only 300 feet from the back of the Temple Theatre.

[James Wyrembelski]

97694201_1484890628366890_631181324303990784_o.jpg97221393_1484929471696339_7962522243232169984_o.jpg98348689_1484845271704759_5635379030908731392_o.jpg

Thank you for asking and the concern! As my post on another forum states, we are absolutely fine. Vassar is doing well from what I see. Although, he has had flooding issues just recently as last year, I think he deserves to be done with that. I have included a few photos that give just a tiny fraction of what's going on up here. This is catastrophic. 21.5 trillion gallons of water released from Gladwin County down through the Sanford and Midland communities. Most roadways connecting us are completely gone.

There were a few counties to the north of us that also experienced some flooding. While not the magnitude we did, there is still lots of damage being caused. Any word from anyone that lives just to the north of us? I had seen that the city of Tawas experienced flooding and I was concerned over their twin screen, the Tawas Family Theater. As well as Oscoda's Lake Theatre.

[Kenneth Wuepper]

Hello James.
Thanks for the great news. Sorry for all of the others that have not fared so well.

Saginaw River still rising at this point. Tittabawassee River very high over the banks. Worse than the last great flood by several feet.