Lake Hancock gravel flow - Winter 2009

In the Winter of 2009, the creek that runs along the east boundary of Eric’s grandfather’s cabin plot suffered some disastrous combination of flooding and landslides, resulting in a massive gravel flow down the creekbed and diverting the creek in several directions, including into the basement of the cabin.  Moisture stains indicate that the creek water was approximately 75cm deep in the basement, and after it drained it left approximately 10cm of mud behind.  Even less wieldy, the sudden erosion deposited a 60cm-thick layer of gravel over the entire eastern side of the property, flowing in front of the cabin and obstructing both the main basement door and the door to the side annex housing the propane tanks.

Another cabin owner keeps a backhoe at the lake, and they dredged out the creekbed somewhat.  We hired a local excavator with a small bulldozer to shove as much of the gravel away from the front of the cabin, but the Department of Natural Resources forbade us from simply depositing the gravel in the lake (where, arguably, the mountain intended it to go).