Flooding lake taking over town

Earth News: North Dakota, U.S.
Aug 27, 2006
DEVILS LAKE, N.D. -- Hundreds of families displaced. Traumatized children. Landowners losing everything and sickened from the stress.
It sounds like New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, but these symptoms are appearing much farther north -- in North Dakota. A popular lake often used for recreation is rising ominously and spreading, drowning homes and lucrative fields of crops.
"It's like a cancer," said Joe Belford, a business owner and county commissioner.
Devils Lake, west of Grand Forks in the north-central part of the state, has risen about 26 feet since 1993. If it keeps rising, and the area's "wet cycle" continues, as some meteorologists predict, the lake could rise an additional 11 feet by 2012.
"With Katrina or Rita, the storm came and left," said Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D. "In this case, the flood comes and stays. It's never over."
Much of the rest of the state, however, is in a record drought. {photo: Joe Belford stands by a county road Thursday that has been flooded by Stump Lake near Devils Lake, N.D.}

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