Over 170 Missing In Colorado Floods

By air and by land, the rescue of hundreds of
people stranded by epic US mountain flooding
has accelerated as debris-filled rivers became
muddy seas that extended into towns and
farms miles from the Rockies. Helicopters and hundreds of National Guard
troops on Saturday searched mountainous
terrain for people as food and water supplies
ran low in remote communities cut off since
Thursday. Thousands were being driven from their
homes in convoys. For the first time since the harrowing floods
began on Wednesday, Colorado got its first
broad view of the devastation. Floodwaters have affected parts of a 11,655-
square-kilometre area. A woman was missing and presumed dead
after witnesses saw floodwaters from the Big
Thompson River destroy her home, Larimer
County sheriff’s spokesman John Schulz said. “We’re sure there are going to be additional
homes that have been destroyed, but we
won’t know that for a while,” Schulz said. “I expect that we’re going to continue to
receive reports of confirmed missing and
confirmed fatalities throughout the next
several days.” Four people have been confirmed dead since
flooding began on Wednesday. More than 170 people remained unaccounted
for in Boulder County, but that number could
include people who are still stranded or who
escaped but have not made contact yet, said
Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle.
Still more rain was expected on Saturday. And the outlook for anyone who preferred to stay
behind was bleak: weeks without power,
mobile phone service or running water. “Essentially, what they were threatening us
with is, ‘If you stay here, you may be here for a
month,”‘ said 79-year-old Dean Hollenbaugh,
who was evacuated by helicopter from
Jamestown, north-west of Boulder.