From Wixom to Withered
What’s left of the Wixom Lake after the flooding, on Nov. 11, 2020.
Construction workers work diligently to repair the damaged road, on Oct. 27, 2020.
Pam Barton explains how the water levels were rising and the experience during the night of the flood, on Oct. 27, 2020.
The view standing on the broken section of Curtis Road overlooking the Tittabawasse River, on Oct. 27, 2020.
The Burton’s view from their living room now looks upon the dry bed of where the Wixom Lake used to be, on Nov. 10, 2020.
Pam Barton shows pictures of her grandaughters gutting the carpet of their basment, on Oct. 27, 2020.
The brush that has taken over in the remaining water left from the Wixom Lake, on Nov. 10, 2020.
With the Edenville dam failing the systems of lakes and rivers connecting to the dam have been drained. Thousands of lake front property owners affected and left to put their homes and lives back together. Wixom Lake residents Pam and Ray Barton watched in horror as Wixom Lake drained in seconds, damaging their home and neighbors alike.
“We had lots of neighbors that helped us, we had our grandkids that came up and helped us. We was pretty fortunate they all come up,” Ray said. Ray and Pam, a 71-year-old couple wadded in the waters of their basement during the night of the flooding, managing to grab what they could before the water levels rose, along with the fear of being electrocuted. 3 inches of mud caked the floor and walls of their basement, it took them two months alone to dry the basement out to the point of assessing the repairs. “We had no power, no gas, no nothing. The M30 bridge everything run under that, that all got destroyed when the bridge caved in all of our utilities got wiped out,” Ray said.
Seeing the wasteland of a lake that now sits in front the Barton’s living room was shocking. Their lake front property is now reduced to what’s hardly passable for a stream. With the loss of the lake the Barton’s home value has diminished tremendously. Seeing their home values decreased by 50%. It’s hard to hear about how much money and time has been spent into saving their home and them expected to pay for the refilling of the lake. This disaster could have been avoided; it also could have gone a lot worse than it did. What if the Barton’s weren’t as fortunate as they were? Putting public safety over personal wealth and gain needs to be the main priority, actually give a fuck about dam maintenance and think of the future.
This assignment was a rollercoaster for me, but I feel that I’ve grown both as a person and as a photojournalist. I feel that have finally stepped onto the starting line of being a pj. I usually don’t have much confidence in my work when it comes to classes like these, but I felt that I was really able to connect with my subject even if there wasn’t much time spent together. I was able to listen and just feel what these people went through, and I just hope that my story is able to give a glimpse of what they experienced and now have to deal with.