Posted at: 08/05/2009 7:41 PM
By: Mary Taing

Print Story  Email to a Friend

New Flood Protection Coming Soon

(ABC 6 NEWS) -- We're nearing the 2-year anniversary of the devastating floods in 2007 that killed seven people, and destroyed homes across Southern Minnesota.

Winona County was one of the hardest hit areas.

Now they're installing new sirens to help alert people in rural areas.

"It's about time because it's dangerous for us not to be protected, we weren't protected that night, nobody let us know what was going on...we could have died," says Brenda Svendson.

She was close to losing her life when the devastating floodwaters rushed through her neighborhood in Goodview.

"We were all knocked off our feet,” she says.

The water came so fast; she and her family didn't have time to run up the hill to get to higher ground.
 
Instead...they fought against the current and swam their way to a neighbor's house.

"I don't know how we swam that far in a current like that. I'd given anything to have a boat come and help me. I'd given anything to have anybody come help me,” she says.

This week county officials announced they’d spend more than 200,000 dollars to install ten new sirens in rural areas across the county.
    
One will go right in the Gunderson Addition where Svendson lives.

"The sirens is huge thing, especially one right in this neighborhood, we're very, very low, " says Svendson

It's a plan she pushed hard to get immediately after the floods hit, and hopes officials will push for more proactive measures so they can be better prepared for natural disasters.

"Sirens, instant alerts, train fire people, that all will really make a difference".

The county is also trying to get federal funding to install weather monitors throughout the region to better detect severe weather.

The grant application has been denied, but county officials tell us they plan to file an appeal.