Quite the crew of spotters I have…two of my friends and my mom called to let me know that the Heart River was jammed full of ice. I was already out and about running errands while my beautiful wife and dashingly handsome boys took their much-needed naps, so I headed out with my camera to join the dozens of gapers investigating the carnage.
I don’t remember seeing the Heart like this since I was a high school kid. There was one time back in the 80s where the ice chunks were much larger, much thicker. Quite frankly, I’m not sure we’ve had the precipitation for something like this during most recent winters.
I actually managed to get this shot without a constant stream of cars in the near lane! That was no small feat; it was a near traffic jam on the bridge for the entire time that I was in the area. I wondered if all Mandan residents got a notice to report to the bridge! By the way, this bridge has a name. Do you know it?
The churning wall of ice and debris clearly had enormous force behind it, and was mere feet from the bottom of the bridge. The log in the foreground was absolutely enormous, but was being tossed about like a rag doll in the ice. It was spun around a couple of times as the ice worked its way past the concrete bridge support, but never lost speed in its trek down the river channel. It’s spooky to consider those forces working on someone unfortunate enough to fall into this mess. They’d be crushed in seconds.
Just south of the bridge, bordered by Highway 1806, this field is now under several feet of water. The bridge in the background is rarely above water; the area below it is for overflow in cases such as this. I used to climb around, hang from, and do other crazy stuff on this bridge as a kid. Most of the time there was only sand below it. Now there’s plenty of ice cold water.
This bridge is next to the Fort Lincoln Trolley station on south 3rd. There were plenty of people as foolhardy as me walking across this bridge. It was very disconcerting to look down between the railroad ties and see the massive wall of ice and debris mere feet below, especially after observing the tremendous force packed between those icy chunks!
One of my favorite angles, although I took many. This is a fun little bridge, even when there isn’t chunky, churning danger below. I’ve got a soft spot for old bridges, though, as the whole Memorial Bridge affair has demonstrated.
Wide angle, anyone? I love my 10-22mm wide angle lens for things like this. It helps give a little bit of perspective to the amazing flow of ice.
Hay Creek seems to be throttling up pretty well too. I found Divide Avenue blocked this evening as well, and it has a high-speed river charging across it. Once the waters subside, I wonder how much damage the road will have sustained.
Just to make things interesting, we’re about to get some freezing temperatures with rain turning to snow Monday. The weather in North Dakota is living up to its reputation this spring!
