MINOT, North Dakota (Reuters) – Floodwaters swamped lower-lying areas of Minot, North Dakota, on Friday as federal officials sharply increased water releases to the already swollen Souris River.
With thousands of homes in the path of the flood, displaced residents settled in for their second mandatory evacuation since just after Memorial Day with the prospect of months in temporary housing.
Up to a quarter of North Dakota's fourth largest city of 41,000 residents were forced out of their homes on Wednesday afternoon. Outside those areas on Friday morning, streets were deserted except for dump trunks moving material toward levees.
By Friday morning, the brownish river water had reached more than two feet above historic 1969 flooding residents had used as a benchmark and just short of a record set 130 years ago.
"It's shooting up real quick right now," said Todd Hamilton, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Bismarck, North Dakota.
Above Minot, the levels in the Souris, or Mouse, river jumped rapidly on Friday and the impact could be seen with a record level at the edge of Minot.
An enormous rush of water was expected in Minot over the next 24 to 36 hours to smash the 1881 record crest by more than six feet and top the 1969 flood by at least 9 feet.
Heavy rains across the Souris River Basin left Canadian reservoirs over capacity. Water rushing down from Canada in turn has forced U.S. officials to make record releases from the Lake Darling Dam above Minot and other communities.
Federal officials sharply increased the amount of water they plan to release from Lake Darling Dam into the swollen River on Thursday, adding up to three feet to the expected peak of flooding in Minot.
WASHINGTON – For the first time, more than half of the children under age 2 in the U.S. are minorities, part of a sweeping race change and a growing age divide between mostly white, older Americans and fast-growing younger ethnic populations that could reshape government policies.
Preliminary census estimates also show the share of African-American households headed by women — mostly single mothers — now exceeds African-American households with married couples, reflecting the trend of declining U.S. marriages overall.
The findings, based on the latest government data, offer a preview of final 2010 census results being released this summer that provide detailed breakdowns by age, race and household relationships.
Demographers say the numbers provide the clearest confirmation yet of a changing social order, one in which racial and ethnic minorities will become the U.S. majority by midcentury.
"We're moving toward an acknowledgment that we're living in a different world than the 1950s, where married or two-parent heterosegxwal couples are now no longer the norm for a lot of kids, especially kids of color," said Laura Speer, coordinator of the Kids Count project for the Baltimore-based Annie E. Casey Foundation.
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