At Third and Orleans, the Great Pacific Coffee Company turned into ground zero Friday in the battle against what locals have dubbed the “Great Flood of ’08.”
With floodwaters already swamping 184 homes and 36 businesses in this historic railroad hamlet, the family that owns the century-old building put up a valiant stand.
They built a berm using hundreds of cocoa-colored sacks filled with sand. They waited with flood pumps and hoses. And inch by inch, they watched the muddy water lap at their life’s treasure as they waited to fend off the onslaught.
“If we can just keep the water out we have a fighting chance,” said owner Dave McHugh, whose family built the three-story red brick building in the early 1900s with artifacts from the 1904 World’s Fair. “We won’t let it go down easy.”
Waging feverish fights
Across hilly swaths of suburbia southwest of St. Louis, feverish fights were waged Friday against the surging Meramec River as it neared all-time highs. Mostly, the river was winning: Waters overflowed their banks for miles around and drove thousands from their homes.
Across the heartland, flood-weary residents fought to save their homes from Arkansas to Ohio, but here at the edge of the looming disaster, where headwaters teased, many tried to contain it.
A few miles away in Eureka, a man remained defiantly seated in his attic as floodwaters rose up foot by foot around his home. Downriver in Fenton, town officials put out an urgent call for volunteers to help place sandbags before the river crests Sunday morning.
Along Interstate Highway 44 in Valley Park, state transportation crews built a wall of concrete barriers and sand to keep waters expected to top 14 feet from covering the highway from a flooded intersection below. By late Friday, officials conceded the efforts were likely futile.
In Valley Park, workers packed sandbags onto a new $50 million levee designed to spare the town but which was showing seepage in spots as floodwaters rose around the community. There the news was better: Federal officials predicted the levee would hold despite the cracks.
After torrential rains this week, the rising Meramec River is displacing about 40,000 people this holiday weekend, state officials said. It could be weeks before the waters recede, they said.
The Meramec was a floating treasure trove: appliances, furniture, gas tanks, vehicles, clothes and boats twirled downriver. One high school teacher took to a kayak to save recreation equipment caught in the river’s tide.
Pacific bore the brunt of the flooding Friday. With floods predicted for days, most residents had time to pack a few belongings and leave. Still, the devastation was overwhelming. Water as tall as professional basketball players swamped the streets.
Making a last stand
The downtown coffeehouse became a place for a last stand.
McHugh, the owner, prepared by moving everything on the first floor upstairs to the room used in the early 1900s as an opera house. He dismantled the expansive bar, leaving the booze on shelves for shots to boost morale.
“This building has so much character and means so much to all of us,” said Jessica Younce, 28, who rents space for a hair salon. She moved everything out save for a historic 2-ton safe she used as a storage bin for supplies.
Toward dusk, the group received an encouraging forecast: The river would crest before dawn Saturday 1 foot less than the anticipated 31.5 feet. That lessened the likelihood of floor flooding.
City officials were already turning their attention to what’s next: receding waters, inspections, letting residents back into their homes and businesses, and cleanup.
Downriver, though, towns like Eureka and Fenton were bracing this weekend for what Pacific endured Friday.
“Who knows what tomorrow may bring,” said Andrew Mullin, sipping a beer during a rest in sandbagging his aunt’s house in Eureka.
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etorriero@tribune.com
