Flooding is a hazard in Sarpy County. Ice jam floods periodically occur in western Sarpy County, usually just south of the confluence of the Elkhorn and Platte Rivers. At 7:30 AM, on Thursday, February 20, 1997, an ice jam flood occurred just north of Highway 6 on the Platte River. Soon after, the Sarpy County Communication Center was alerted to a fire at a house surrounded by water just north of Highway 6. The Gretna Fire Department, and Sarpy County Emergency Management, Highway and Sheriff Departments all responded to the call, since ice jam floods occur and worsen quickly.

Flood waters rose north of Highway 6, covering 252 Street (above photo). Gretna Fire Department, with the assistance of the Bellevue Underwater Rescue Team and the Sarpy County Sheriff's Department, evacuated the area by 11 AM. At that time, Sarpy County Commissioner Tim Schram signed a county disaster declaration.

Sarpy County is a participant in an interlocal agreement designed to respond to ice jams. The Papio-Missouri Natural Resources District (PMNRD) contacted its explosives contractor and, by 12:45, blasting of the ice jam began (photo above).

In the photo above, the contractor is seen assessing the effectiveness of charges placed two minutes before the blast.

The ice covering the Platte River averaged 18 inches thick. The ice slabs in the photo above are typical blast remnants.

Additional assistance arrived on Friday in the form of a BNRR crane (photo above left) and Nebraska Department of Roads Crane (above left). The cranes kept the slabs from getting hung up on sand bars under the bridges after the explosions freed them from the jam.

At 2 PM on Friday sand boils were detected on the land side of the levee, south of the confluence of the Elkhorn and Platte Rivers. The Sarpy County Highway Department brought sand (photo above) and sandbaggers to help.

Assisting the Highway Department in the human sandbag chain were Commissioner Tim Schram and members of the Sarpy County Emergency Management Agency, Army Corps of Engineers, and the PMNRD.

The sandbag boil trap after 90 minutes (photo above).

The completed sandbag boil trap only took 2 hours to build (photo above). Despite a full day of ice jam blasting, over a mile of the two and a half mile jam remained intact.

Saturday morning an ice jam broke loose several miles upstream. The photo above is the first of a series, taken from southeast of the confluence of the Platte and Elkhorn Rivers. Ice can be seen just north of the confluence, in the left of the photo.
A few minutes later, the ice advanced past the confluence and actually flowed upstream into the Elkhorn River.

About ten minutes later, the water level had risen over six inches. By early afternoon, this ice met and lengthened the initial ice jam. By early afternoon, water was flowing over the levee for roughly a mile stretch.

Blasting was finally successful at 5:30 PM on Saturday. The channel above was a sight for sore eyes, as water levels dropped quickly. The total public and private damage figures of over $300,000 reflect neither the inconvenience to residents, nor the disruption of services and overtime required to respond to and recover from to this incident.

All photographs are property of, and used with the permission of, Joe Mastandrea. No reproduction, rebroadcast, or other use of these images is allowed without the express written approval of the owner.

Return to the Archive Index

Revised April 16, 1997

This document qualifies as HTML 4.0 transitional!