This is Riverview Circle’s response to Moorhead’s Code Red that indicates evacuations are likely. Another pickup with another load of sandbags has just pulled into John Brummer’s garage and another crowd of volunteers has arrived to stack it on the sandbag dike that rings this neighborhood along three miles of shoreline.
I asked him if he has a plan if this effort fails and he says his house is a foot above the crest line. For the record, he’s not thinking it won’t work, of course. “We’ve given it the good fight,” he said. And for the first time in three days, his smile waned and his humor gave way for a second. So he paused, clapped his hands twice, and headed out to the sandbags.
There’s still work to be done.
Buses are still streaming into the neighborhood, but getting enough sandbags has been problematic all afternoon.
Throughout Moorhead this afternoon, police are escorting conveys as if they’re in charge of the nation’s money supply. In a way, they are. On Riverview Circle — and most of the Red River Valley — the only currency that matters today is a filled sandbag.