Corvallis, Oregon is a pleasantly nondescript college town in the middle of the Pacific Northwest’s Willamette Valley. Most of the time, not a lot goes on here; crime rates are low, sewing circle attendance is high, and natural disasters are rare. So rare in fact, that an April 2011 analysis published in the New York Times designated Corvallis as the best place in the US to live if you want to avoid a natural disaster. They found it to be the lowest-risk metropolitan area (defined loosely, as it is a city of less than 60,000 people) based on the likelihood of tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, flooding, drought, hail, and other extreme weather.
Where to Live to Avoid a Natural Disaster; New York Times, April 30th, 2011
To drive home the point that nowhere is entirely safe however, significant flooding in January 2012 disrupted life in our idyllic town for several days. 4.02 inches of rain fell in a 24 hour period, the third most in over one hundred years of recorded history. Landslides in the hills on the outskirts of town prompted the local high school was designated as an evacuation center, and downed trees and feet of standing water lead to significant highway closures.
Canoes temporarily took the place of cars. Photo: Corvallis Gazette Times
As a middle schooler at the time, I was thrilled for the chance to miss a bit of school and ogle at the images my friends were sending me of their families canoeing through the streets. As you can’t call yourself an Oregonian unless you own at least one canoe (and a beat up pair of Birkenstocks, for those keeping score at home) Corvallis residents were uniquely prepared to deal with the encroaching floodwaters. Lucky enough to live on a hill, I was able to sit back, enjoy the day off from school and relax in the dry safety of my home. All told, no people or animals were injured or killed in the flood and the water receded to normal levels within a few short days. Perhaps Corvallis does earn its “safest town in the US” moniker after all.
Photo: Corvallis Gazette Times
Caption: "Postal carrier Mark Judge delivers the mail Thursday, undaunted by a flooded Conifer Boulevard. Judge said later in the day that his feet became numb during the 2 1/2 hours he was wading through high water, which prevented him from reaching a few postal customers".
References
“NWS Portland.” National Weather Service, 24 Oct. 2005, w2.weather.gov/climate/local_data.php?wfo=pqr.
“The Flood of 2012.” Corvallis Gazette Times, 20 Jan. 2012, www.gazettetimes.com/news/local/the-flood-of/article_96c74746-4339-11e1-be3a-0019bb2963f4.html.
“Where to Live to Avoid a Natural Disaster.” The New York Times, 30 Apr. 2011, archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/05/01/weekinreview/01safe.html?hp.
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