"PEOPLE! Someone just needs to get in there and shut this thing off!"

Our first look this morning after several feet of water inundated the church building. To those who are superstitious, it is Friday the 13th.






"What does the worker gain from his toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on men. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil—this is the gift of God. I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that men will revere him. --Ecclesiastes 3.9-14

The church building...


The Idylwild community west of our campus (church building far background, Iowa River far right)...


City Park (foreground) and U of Iowa's Mayflower Residence Hall (background) and Iowa River (between) to the south of the church campus...


Coralville Lake/Reservoir (left), emergency spillway (bottom) and dam release (water ploom top) about three hours up river from us...

We were told today that not only is the staff being moved out and the building vacated, but that we needed to completely evacuate the building and move anything we could grab. Such sudden news was met with yet another valiant army of people to help move everything of value from the building before the waters got too high and begin penetrating the exterior walls.

The time of our arrival mid-afternoon.


The lobby turned stuff-to-be-moved room.


The building's main entryway turned dock and exitway.


...and loaded into multiple 53' semitrailers.


Other belongings were brought out by hand, and we had to make a bridge through the parking lot. Felt very bayou-ish.


Our main Tech booth scathed of A LOT of equipment and cabling...


No more sandbagging for us...we're outta here!


One last look...

We're running out of sandbagging space...


Some views from the church building roof facing west to south...

...and east to south.


Mandatory evacuations are now being implemented for people in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City. Some are given time until the end of the day to vacate...others, only a half-hour.

I made my second trip to the Coralville Reservoir this morning to capture some images of the spillway. The dam is located on the far side of the spillway, which controls most of the Iowa River flow (Clear Creek joins and adds to the Iowa River further downstream). The amount of water released from the dam is almost to its maximum (currently 27,000 cubic feet of water per second); the release is supposed to be completely opened by next Wednesday (40,000 CFS). On top of that amount is what ever water passes over the spillway (seen below), which renders our efforts useless to contain any excessive water still held by the dam.



Some people, though, still maintain a light view of the circumstances...



Some shots of the nearby area...



Still sandbagging! There are now teams of people going to residences neighboring our church campus to help them sandbag their homes too. Because we're doing this, we've established what remains of our parking lot as the North Iowa City headquarters for sandbagging.

And the waters keep rising...

Flooding has been occurring on the church campus for more than a week, and now it's becoming somewhat reputable. Here's how things looked this past Saturday the 7th...

The very next day, June 8th...



Word was released that the dam controlling the water was continually going to be opened because the reservoir water level was getting to the height that the water was about to go over the excess spillway. So, the decision was made to wait no longer...we needed to sandbag the church building.

An e-mail was sent to a mass mailing list, the local Christian radio station was called, and we had an army of help. AMAZING. People brought their shovels, their trucks...even their bulldozers.







And this morning, June 9th...