The Byrd River Flood

By Mary Flodin

Some things never change.

Inspired by the true story of the 1995 Pajaro River flood in Watsonville, California, "The Byrd River Flood" is an adaptation excerpted from the thriller, "Fruit of the Devil". It portrays the social, emotional, environmental, personal, and political causes and costs of locating farmworker housing on the flood plain of a major river.

Since the founding of Santa Cruz in the 1800s, the Pajaro Barrio has been destroyed by water and buried in mud, only to be rebuilt in the same location, flood after flood. The most recent "costliest storm in NorCal history," the El Niño flood of 2020, played out eerily like all other major floods documented since 1880, including the 1995 disaster portrayed here.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paper Angel Press
• Release date: Jun 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9781957146355

Mary Flodin

Before settling into the writer’s life, Mary taught environmental education, English, and art for over twenty-five years in California public schools.She lives in a cottage on the Central California Coast with her husband — a retired NASA climate scientist — and their dog, koi, chickens, and gopher herd, where she spends her time practicing permaculture gardening, plein air painting, making pottery, bird watching, swimming, and enjoying life on the Monterey Bay ... and, of course, writing.

Book preview

The Byrd River Flood

Mary Flodin

This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, organizations, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

copyright © 2023 by Mary Flodin

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, except for the purpose of review and/or reference, without explicit permission in writing from the publisher.

Cover design copyright © 2023 by Niki Lenhart

nikilen-designs.com

Published by Paper Angel Press

paperangelpress.com

ISBN 978-1-957146-57-7 (EPUB)

FIRST EDITION

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

WatershedsCreeks and Rivers

A tidal wave, a rising wall of black water raced down the thirty-mile-long Byrd River, carving away banks, grabbing whole trees out by the roots, lifting shopping carts, tumbling truck tires, old shoes, bits of plastic, a nest of drowned rats. Four large metal storage barrels marked with red skull and crossbones slid down an eroded bank and fell into the river, bouncing and rolling downstream. The water tossed giant boulders like they were made of cardboard, bumping them against the metal barrels and dragging rocks and barrels along the river bottom. Hundreds of gallons per minute of swirling water scoured thick sediments laden with pesticides, detergents, motor oil, and estrogens out of the river rocks. Salamander eggs, frog eggs, salmon and trout eggs in the gravel redds washed away. The churning black caldron, rising and boiling in Earth’s belly, pushed toward Valle Verde.

The Byrd River Flood

MONDAY, APRIL 18

San Benito County Emergency Operations Center

(Passover Begins at Sundown)

Santa Cruz Mountains

Byrd River Watershed, San Benito County

I do not copy, the Sheriff’s dispatcher stared through the windows at the storm lashing the mountains below, and shouted again into the mic. Repeat. Please repeat. Over.

Perched high atop a bald peak in the Santa Cruz Mountains, the small San Benito County Emergency Operations Center Outpost was lit up like a lighthouse in the storm. Static hissed over the Emergency Ops radio.

Thunder roared. The Sheriff’s dispatcher turned to the EOC chief.

Forked lightning flashed in the dark window frame, followed by another roll of thunder. Rain pinged like bullets on the roof.

What was that? asked the EOC chief, who was standing over a large USGS topographical map