Flood victims long for home
VjKAfNU rUKAi, IN.D. (AFJ —
They told Henry Howe to get out of
town. It was no use.
“I’ve got a home and business, and
I’ve got to get in here,” Howe said.
He is one of hundreds of people
who have defied evacuation orders and
skirted lax martial law to get at their
property since the Red River flooded
this city of50,000 people 11 days ago.
“I don’t know what else I’d do,”
Howe said. “I’m really worried about
my home.”
Some people are even living at
home again, despite having no tap
water or sewer service.
“Anybody that knows the city and
has a brain right now can get in,” said
Scott Carlson, a National Guardsman
manning the only traffic checkpoint
in town during the weekend.
During the night, police crisscross
the city and helicopters circle desolate
neighborhoods, using high-tech infra
red and night-vision scopes to look for
looters.
By day, homeowners bustle about,
all of them in on the worst-kept secret
in town: Security is loose.
Most of the authorities are locals,
sympathetic to people’s need to get
home.
“If they’re in their homes, we’re
not going to bother them,” Carlson
said.
Residents of drier sections of the
city were allowed to visit their prop
erty Sunday for a fourth day, and resi
dents of some parts of neighboring
East Grand Forks, Minn., were al
lowed back for the first time.
But many others entered areas still
officially closed.
“There’s no way they can keep
people from coming over here,” said
Barb Faulkenberry, inspecting her
home behind security lines Saturday.
“Since about every road is open, you
don’t have the manpower to do that.”
Guardsmen and police who ran
domly patrol the neighborhoods are
turning a blind eye to residents too
anxious to keep away.
“I think it’s pretty easy to tell the
good guys from the bad guys,”
Faulkenberry said.
Water continued to recede Sunday,
revealing more of the thick layer of
mud covering the streets. Abandoned
cars sat askew on sidewalks. Tfash was
strewn everywhere.
“Everyone along here lost the
sandbag battle,” said Jason
Gierszewski, as he slid on mud coat
ing the basement of his grandfather’s
home.
The throb of generators could be
heard throughout the neighborhood.
Roy Beard sat in a chair in the
bright morning sun while a pump la
bored to drain his basement. Nearby,
furniture floated in the gray-green
water, along with one of his daughter’s
shiny black shoes.
Officials have said some areas are
clearly unsafe, and they have even put
off searching part of the downtown
that was gutted by a mid-flood fire.
Fears that some people might have
been overlooked in the evacuation
were heightened when a dehydrated,
disoriented man was rescued from his
flooded home Friday and taken to a
state mental hospital.
“I think we’ve had two people res
cued who didn’t fully know what was
happening,” said Jack Stevens, a vol
unteer at the American Red Cross
medical center at the Grand Forks Air
Force Base outside the city.
Meanwhile, the front edge of the
flood crest on the northward-flowing
Red River moved through the little
farming communities of Pembina and
St. Vincent, Minn., a few miles from
the Canadian border. The Pembina
River, which joins the Red at Pembina,
also was surging, aggravated by wa
ter flowing in from the Red.
The two-dozen residents of Leroy,
N.D., about 25 miles west of Pembina,
had to be evacuated.
Red spares most of UND campus
FLOODING from page 1
students April 19 when President
Kendall Baker called off classes and
graduation as the town began to evacu
ate.
Only a handful of administrators
are operating the abandoned univer
sity. Most of them are living and sleep
ing in the headquarters of UND’s
physical plant, said UND spokesman
Peter Johnson.
Now that the flooding is beginning
to go down at UND, the university
faces immediate problems, not the
least of which is contacting staff, fac
ulty and students and beginning to
coordinate cleanup.
“Definitely, the worst is past,”
Johnson said.
Despite the damages it sustained
from the flood, UND is lucky com
pared to most of the swamped, fire
gutted city and will play an important
role in the recovery of the town,
Johnson said. Residence halls, class
rooms and the gym may be used to
house evacuees returning to their
homes.
“UND will act as a beachhead for
moving back to town,” Johnson said.
Johnson said he hoped students
will be able to return to Grand Forks
in the next few weeks to pack their
remaining belongings from dorms and
apartments but is unsure how soon that
will be.
“I don’t think anyone was prepared
for what happened,” Johnson said.
Anyone wishing to help the
North Dakota residents impacted by
the flood can call the University of
North Dakota at 1-800-342-8230 or
1-800-225-5863.
SWAT team arrests
man making threats
By Matthew Waite
Senior Reporter
A man was arrested without in
cident after he brought the Lincoln
Police SWAT team to his house by
threatening himself and police of
ficers over the phone with a gun
Saturday afternoon.
However, the man did not have
a gun as he walked outside his
house and was arrested by mem
bers of the SWAT team. Officers on
the scene would not comment on
any weapons found inside the
man’s residence, other than to say
there were guns in the house.
Sgt. Stan Kubicek refused to re
lease the man’s name, citing state
law concerning the mentally ill.
Kubicek did say the man was white
and in his 30s and was an on-and
off resident of the house.
Police had been called to 701
S. 84th St. on a service call by a
man who said he had mental health
and alcohol problems, Kubicek
said.
Officers called the man, and
after a few minutes, he went
through some violent mood swings,
Kubicek said. During that time, he
also threatened officers and him
self with a shotgun and a large bore
rifle that he said he had inside.
After the threats, officers called
the SWAT team, a specially trained
force made up of Lincoln police
volunteers.
Kubicek said the man was de
lusional and intoxicated, and offic
ers were concerned about the men
tal health issues.
The man was arrested, and re
sisted being put into a cruiser. Once
inside, he kicked the doors and
windows, so officers then had to
bind his legs.
Eventually the man was taken
away in a cruiser, but Kubicek re
fused to say where he was going.
He said police concerns now were
on the man’s mental health issues
and that all reports will be for
warded to the county attorney for
review.
Law & Or
Shots fired
Lincoln Police recovered a shot
gun Sunday morning that was used
during a fight near the intersection
of Winthrop Road and Colonial
Drive, Lincoln Police Sgt. Steve
Imes said.
Imes said a fight broke out in
the area, and someone fired the
gun, breaking a window at a house
at 2400 Winthrop Road.
When police arrived, a number
of cars and spectators were leav
ing the area. Police do not know
who fired the gun.
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