Kaweah River Flood of Nov. 2002 Reports

Powerhouse Rapid: "Our house shook, the windows rattled, the roar of the river was pounding increasingly louder with each rolling boulder, some Janet Reno sized and others larger.  Janet Reno rests peacefully intact at same location, along with Al Gored next to her. 'Al Gored' boulder is larger and shakier.  The river left channel is almost unchanged.  The center channel is now boulder blocked on right side of center at bottom where Janet and Al reside, however, a new channel opened left of center and is runnable at todays (11-10-02) level.  It is a little narrow for large rafts but they will squeeze through.  Because of the change you will now find yourself pillowed on the large house boulder just across the channel from Janet Reno and the new 'Al Gored'.  Looks as if you can ride the pillow and decend to the right of the rock.  It is the one with the old retaining wall.  The cool thing is the right channel at 800 or better is runnable, although tight, it is better and looks quite fun.  The entrances are cleaned out and the flood has cleaned out trees, bushes, and debris."  -Don Falkenborg, 11-10-02

First run following the flood: North Fork at Bailey Bridge at 12:30 Sun. was 1.35 ft., Dinely gage is gone. Made a run from below the Chute to North Fork Bridge at 1PM on Sun. 11-10. Power house is UGLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY. There are 2 big rocks up in the air guarding the exit of the center route. Big drop off below the two big rocks even at 1600cfs. The left side is good. Right side is unchanged. Bumper still has S-turns. Cyonotic is unchanged. -Alan Parker, 11-11-02

Jason's observations from the bank: The Dinely eyeball guage is gone, can find it, saw it Thursday mornin at 7:30, but it's no longer with us! I don't know, but by the look of the holiday area, it got BIG. so I went to Holiday Rapid, and the entrance has a bit of a larger hole to it, right before the entrance eddy, not a major change. the rapid itself looks normal, middle is unchanged, but lower looks different. Lower (Holiday) has a picnic bench lodged at the top, on river left, but appears to be out of play. Left channel seems to be flattened out a bit. maybe easier; but middle lower holiday has a new big boulder right in the middle of it with a hole just upstream of it...looks like a potentially nasty place to ever go, recipe for pinning. Definitely a change from last season. Also, bumper is unchanged for the most part, although I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but it seems that the river has channeled more h2o to the far river right area, in the small, not usually boated channel. Not sure about this, but I kinda get that feeling by looking at it. Suiside area didn't look different from below, but who knows above it. The Chair looked clear as well. I want to preface this info with the fact that I haven't had a chance to run it yet, so all if this is by looking from the bank...there could be trees, strainers, etc, that I haven't seen, in other words. I'm very curoius about that huge hanging tree just a click downstream from the Riverview. That thing has got to be hangin by a thread by now, who knows...! I'm going to try to run Dinely down one of these mornings, I'll send info if I run it. -Jason Jetter, 11-11-02

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Last modified: 11.11.02