PORT ANGELES — Lake Sutherland residents worked together Tuesday to clear a logjam that was the cause of flooding.
They began work a day after receiving verbal permission from state Department of Fish and Wildlife officials.
Lakeside residents reported their docks were underwater and water was approaching some cabins and homes, as well as flooding the basements of others, after a combination of excessive rainfall and a logjam in Indian Creek caused the lake to rise an estimated 2 feet above the normal level Monday.
By 11 a.m. Tuesday, the lake’s water level had dropped by a couple of inches, according to volunteers who have been checking on their properties.
“We made a plan with [Fish and] Wildlife to free the water in a slow manner,” said Matt Downing, a resident who acted as foreman of the operation.
In accordance with Fish and Wildlife instructions, the logs that formed the logjam had to remain in or stay adjacent to the creek, and were tied to vegetation along the banks of the creek, Downing said.
Parts of docks and other man-made materials that had floated down the stream to join the logjam were to be removed.
More than 250 people have land along the shores of the popular lake community, where some families live and others have had summer cabins for generations, residents said.
High water and wind had carried enough debris into its outlet to Indian Creek to create blockage, keeping rainfall and snowmelt from draining away.
It was unclear to residents at first who had the authority to approve work to clear the creek, Downing said.
“I went to about eight county offices before they sent me to Fish and Wildlife,” he said.
The lake and river are under state management, and the property owners do not have the authority to have the blockage removed without the proper permits, which in some cases can take months to get, residents had said.
The county has no authority over the lake.
Permits can be obtained in an emergency, said Madonna Luers, spokeswoman for Fish and Wildlife.
“Especially when damage is being done, permits are turned around the same day,” Luers said.
The situation at Lake Sutherland certainly qualified for that, she added.
Stewart Smith, who owns the property adjacent to the logjam in Indian Creek, opened the gate to his property, and a property owner at the lake provided a commercial truck to help move logs.
At least eight volunteers from the Lake Sutherland community, many of whom were dressed in hard hats and hip waders, sloshed through the cold, clear water to shift logs and attach debris to a winch for hauling out.
On Tuesday morning, one large log remained partially in the water a few hundred feet downstream from the lake outlet, while a pile of smaller logs was untangled and moved to shoreline locations.
A large section of dock with a boat cradle was anchored just upstream from the logjam.
Indian Creek was running much higher than usual, said Ross Burwell, a lake resident who assisted in the clearing of the logjam Tuesday.
Usually it is not navigable near the mouth, Burwell said.
On Monday, the creek was 4 or 5 feet deep and more than 20 feet wide, flowing smoothly until it reached rapids downstream from the logjam.
Lake Sutherland is a 350-acre natural lake that was formed 8,000 years ago when a landslide separated it from Lake Crescent.
While Lake Crescent’s water level rose about 70 feet and found a new outlet at Lyre River after the landslide, Lake Sutherland still drains through the original outlet at Indian Creek, a tributary of the Elwha River.
The creek and lake are home to native kokanee sockeye salmon, a landlocked form of Pacific salmon; coastal cutthroat trout; and rainbow trout.
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Reporter Arwyn Rice can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 56250, or at arice@peninsuladailynews.com.
