Squaw Creek surges in winter storm

Squaw Creek got a little rambunctious as ice built up then broke during winter storms. photo by Jeff McCaulou

On Wednesday, January 7, Sisters City Hall got a call from Tim Clasen who lives south of Sisters. Clasen reported that Squaw Creek was very high and that there would soon be excess water in town.

Gary Frazee, Sisters' Public Works Director, headed to the bridge on Elm Street in the snow plow he was operating.

"By the time I got to Squaw Creek ... the water was back to normal," he said.

Kathy Nagel, who also lives on Squaw Creek south of town, heard loud crashes and retreated to the house to gather her children. By the time the kids were together and Nagel was ready to vacate the premises the crashing noise had stopped.

"The whole thing happened in 10 minutes, start to finish," Nagel said.

The next morning, Thursday, January 8, Gerry Tewalt surveyed the results downstream and called Frazee.

He said, "I've never seen anything like it and I was born here."

Tewalt lives off Highway 126 just where Squaw Creek starts to open up and fan out into a flood plain about a mile out of town.

At this site large chunks of snow and ice had been deposited, adding four more feet of frozen water to this section of the creek.

A huge amount of snow was displaced by the 10-minute surge.

Frazee explained, "It (the surge) got out here and spread out "cause it's so wide and it lost its momentum."

What caused the sudden gusher?

"Everybody's got their theory," Frazee said. "Between 2:30 and 4 something happened up in the mountains, at least one mile above town. Between the cold weather, snow, ice, or maybe an avalanche, something caused Squaw Creek to become dammed up above so when it finally backed the water up far enough to break loose then all this water came racing down through town."

In town, Squaw Creek went from a 10-foot-wide channel to a 30-foot-wide channel after the event, according to Frazee.