Nicole Kor, a student at University of Minnesota Duluth, talks about escaping from her basement apartment last night.
The official Duluth total rainfall on June 19-20, 2012, was 7.25”, with Duluth International Airport breaking several rainfall records during this weather event. Locally high amounts in the 8–10-inch range were reported throughout Duluth neighborhoods and along the North Shore of Lake Superior. The steep terrain, and numerous creeks and rivers, played a significant role in the devastating damage and flooding that occurred in the Duluth community. The Fond Du Lac and West Spirit Mountain neighborhoods of Duluth and Thomson Township in Carlton County were evacuated, and a raging Kingsbury Creek flooded the Lake Superior Zoo, drowning over a dozen animals.
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[MUSIC PLAYING] NICOLE KOR: Me and my neighbor can pretty much hear each other over the wall, and all of a sudden I heard her kind of yelling. And we came out in the entryway, and there's a little bit of water leaking through. And so we're like, oh, no, grab towels. And everything was fine.
And we mopped it up, and then everything went back to normal. And all of a sudden, I heard like a gushing noise. And I go and look in my living room, and that window right there, water started gushing through the window because the current was up to here.
So we called 911. And they were like, you need to get out or you're going to get trapped and drown. And so I grabbed my cat and put him in a tote, a plastic tote with my cell phone. We went to this entryway.
And then her boyfriend broke down the door, and the current like grabbed me. And I cut my foot on something. And then he grabbed me and like, threw me at the grass.
And I just remember climbing up in the water with this tote. We all went up and then walked to SA. And then we all realized we were bleeding everywhere.
SPEAKER: That was Nicole Kor, a student at the University of Minnesota Duluth who escaped from her basement apartment along with her neighbors last night in the flooding there, the worst flooding in Duluth in 40 years. We continue to cover the story here on All Things Considered from Minnesota Public Radio News and online at mprnews.org.
This afternoon, Governor Mark Dayton issued a state of emergency declaration due to the flooding in Duluth. Police there are warning people to stay off the streets in the city. Stay tuned here to Minnesota Public Radio News. We'll continue to bring you coverage throughout the afternoon.