A River Gone Wild

Stuntzner Engineering & Forestry was called upon to assist with finding facts associated with a home located on river front property that had been damaged in 2006 by a river changing locations. One of the tasks Stuntnzer was hired to do was to produce maps showing the changes in river banks over time and to map the location of the part of a revetment (or dike) that was destroyed. The house was built 100 feet from the river at the time of construction.  The rock revetment appeared to be constructed to prevent the river from moving toward the homes in the area.  A 2006 storm moved the river and destroyed portions of both the dike and the house.

Stuntzner used field measurements to locate buildings, roads and other physical features to orient and scale historical photos from 1938 to present.  Once oriented and scaled the banks of the river were drawn on each photo giving snapshots of the riverbank location from 1938 to the present. As-builts maps of the dike were not available.  In the field we found boulders much larger than the rest of the river rock and geotextile fabric under and between these rocks. The locations of the rock and the fabric were located and then drawn on the overlaid photos, and it was assumed that this was the location of the destroyed dike section.

By looking at these photos you can see the river changed courses drastically as much as 500 feet over the 60 year period. It is not uncommon for rivers in Oregon to change course like this one and this river is no wilder than the rest.