For a second straight week, Clark County experienced a weather event beyond the norm.
This time around, a high wind storm courtesy of a cold front brought trees crashing down all around the region overnight on Tuesday, Dec. 16, into Wednesday, Dec. 17.
Numerous power outages affected sections of Battle Ground and other areas of north Clark County, leaving residents without power overnight. Traffic lights were out throughout the area, and trees were down across roadways and across power lines. Many businesses were forced to shut down for several hours on Dec. 17 due to a power outage.
Residents along Southwest 20th Avenue experienced a prolonged power outage lasting more than 12 hours after a large tree fell across the roadway and onto power lines. Crews remained working at the scene past 9 p.m., as observed by The Reflector.
“The City’s Public Works Operations crews were out as early as 2 a.m. on Wednesday morning to assess the damage and contain any hazards they identified,” Battle Ground Communications Manager Alisha Smith said. “In situations like this where downed trees impact powerlines, Clark Public Utilities takes charge for not only restoring power but also managing the removal of the tree(s). The City’s Public Works staff are not trained or certified to work with high voltage powerlines, but rather we support CPU by helping to identify and contain the hazard until their trained staff can safely clear the tree and work to restore power.”
All Battle Ground Public Schools were also closed due to the widespread power outages. Other school districts opted for a late start due to power issues.
Clark Public Utilities (CPU) Communications Manager Dameon Pesanti stated in an email that at its peak, CPU recorded just over 98,000 customers without power in Clark County. Currently, that total has dipped below 38,000.
"Outages started at about 1:15 a.m., and we had about 10,000 people without power in about five minutes," Pesanti stated. "Customer service and operations crews worked through the night. Since early this morning, we’ve had more than 200 field employees and contractors working outages for both water and electric systems. We anticipate having the majority of customers back online by this evening—provided the weather continues to be favorable."
After the wind event, a calm day of weather ensued the majority of Dec. 17. But by everyone’s morning commute on Thursday, Dec. 18, another atmospheric river struck the region.
Since Dec. 14, the RadarScope app shows that the vast majority of rural north Clark County has accumulated over 3 inches of rain on top of already heavily saturated soils all of last week.
On Dec. 18 alone, Battle Ground accumulated 2.34 inches of rain, the highest single-day total since Dec. 5, 2023, according to Battle Ground Weather Facebook group admin, Tyler Mode.
The Dec. 18 atmospheric river swiftly caused flooding in area creeks, and the East Fork Lewis River again exceeded flood stage.
The river began its journey at 14.7 feet at the Heisson gauge at 4:30 a.m. on Dec. 18 and climbed all the way up to 19.42 feet, reaching the action stage at 12:15 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 19, according to river data by the United States Geological Survey.
