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<br />the vulnerable areas, including individual buildings. While one of the proposed <br />mitigation measures was to use the athletic fields to create a large detention area to keep <br />water from the area behind the Library and the Student Center, that plan has not been <br />implemented. <br /> <br />Water levels on campus significantly exceeded the estimated 1 OO-year water levels. At <br />the College Avenue Gym, at the east border of campus, the 1997 water levels were 1.3 <br />feet higher than the IOO-year event. At the heating plant, the water levels exceeded the <br />IOO-year elevations by 5.2 feet and up to 7.2 feet at the building entrance. At the' <br />Engineering parking lot, the flood elevation was 2 feet higher than the proj ected 100- year <br />level. The water level in the Lagoon area west of the Lory Student Center and Morgan <br />Library was 2.7 feet higher than the IOO-year elevation. <br /> <br />Using rainfall data from the 1997 event, Ayres used a model to calculate discharges at <br />various points on the campus, On the west side at Elizabeth and Shields Streets, the <br />estimated peaK discharge was 1890 cfs, compared to a projected 100-year value of 490 <br />cfs, The estimated flow from the Lagoon area into the Engineering parking lot was 930 <br />cfs, compared to a projected IOO-year value of 50 cfs. The estimated flow through the <br />railroad embankment near the heating plant was 320 cfs, compared to a projected 100- <br />year flow of 40 cfs. <br /> <br />Figure 6 shows the areas of campus that were flooded and the buildings receiving <br />damage, The map also shows estimated flows from the SWMM model for the 1997 <br />event and the 100 year event. Note that actua1l997 flows (as estimated after the flood) <br />exceeded modeled 100-year flows by large factors, such as 18,6 from the Lagoon area <br />into the Engineering parking lot. <br /> <br />Actions by the City of Fort Collins <br /> <br />Emergency response. Emergency response in the City was overseen by Glenn Levy <br />(1997), a Battalion Chief for the Poudre Fire Authority (pF A) with experience and <br />training in emergency response. According to Levy, the night of July 28th was very busy <br />for the emergency response team. Normally, heavy rain causes traffic accidents and also <br />automatic fire alanns to go off due to the rain, basements get flooded, but there is also a <br />city to run with other fire calls, medical emergencies, traffic accidents, and other <br />demands. So when the flood occurred, it created a tremendous impact on services, <br /> <br />The night of July 28 began with heroic rescues, From 8:30 until about 10:45 p,m., 15 <br />minutes before the flood in the trailer park, firefighters rescued over 200 people from <br />cars, from buildings, and from areas that were flooded, such as by pushing them through <br />intersections. CSU's Police Department had to relocate to the City because their building <br />was flooded, In the 911 dispatch center, there was a call every 16 seconds for a period of <br />time (Figure 10). A building exploded from natural gas, a train derailment occurred in the <br />center of town with four cars derailed, and the PF A heard that one of the cars had deadly <br />chlorine gas, Luckily, the rail car with the chlorine gas did not derail. The Poudre Fire <br />Authority broke into businesses to get life jackets to deal with the flooding, The last <br /> <br />7 <br />