Residents in Wisconsin community return home after dam breach leads to evacuations
MANAWA, Wisconsin — People living downstream from a dam in Wisconsin, broken by flood water Police said Saturday that many people were allowed to return home after an evacuation order was issued, and many of them are now dealing with the mess of cleaning out flooded basements.
The dam in Manawa along the Little Wolf River was breached Friday afternoon by rainwater that washed away an estimated 50 feet (15.2 meters) wide of the dam, Manawa Police Chief Jason Severson said.
The dam break occurred after the National Weather Service reported that about 5 inches (12.7 centimeters) of rain had fallen in a few hours in that area of eastern Wisconsin.
An order to evacuate homes south of the Manawa Dam was issued Friday, but that order was lifted at 5 p.m. in the city about 55 miles (88 kilometers) west of Green Bay after flooding subsided and a highway along which most of the affected homes are located was reopened, Severson said Saturday.
Dozens of homes in the community of about 1,200 residents were temporarily evacuated, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many homes were affected by the order, he said. There were no reports of injuries following Friday’s dam break, Severson said.
While officials need to repair two local roads damaged by floodwaters, the main clean-up work in Manawa will focus on residents whose basements were flooded, he said.
“There are a lot of homes that got water in their basements. The water was so high that it was just flowing down the streets and some people had damage to their property,” Severson told The Associated Press.
He said a high school and a Masonic lodge that had been serving as emergency shelters were closed Friday night as people returned to their homes. But the Manawa wastewater treatment plant, which was overwhelmed by the flooding, remained offline Saturday and a boil-water notice was in place for the town.
Christine Boissonnault spent most of Friday in shelter at the local high school after being evacuated from her mobile home. She said it was shocking to see the water damage in Manawa.
“I cried when I came down and saw it. My daughter works in the store and she said she saw the water running down the road,” Boissonnault said WFRV-TV.
Severson said a Wisconsin Department of Transportation employee inspected the area Friday and found the dam appears to be intact, except for erosion on one side.
The weather service warns that rain and possibly thunderstorms are possible during the weekend and early next week.