LAFAYETTE — The Vermilion river continues to run high in Lafayette. Thursday morning it was measured 15 feet at the Surrey Street gauge. One woman living on Wilderness Trail told KATC she has not been able to leave her home since Monday, the water too high to drive through.
"Right here by the mailbox, that part right there is 11, 11 and a half [inches]," Lillie Murphy said.
She met KATC as close as she could, which was about 100 yards away. She came home from work Monday morning and is now unable to leave.
"It's kind of crazy. I'm not used to staying in one spot," Murphy said.
According to Murphy, the water continues to rise over the road. Over the last few days, she has taken several pictures. A picture with a noon time stamp from Wednesday shows dry grass around a mailbox. Another photo taken on Thursday at 6 AM shows the mailbox submerged in water, but the grass behind it dry. A picture taken six hours later shows the mailbox and yard covered in water.
"The water gets deep out there. We are at a grade; you can see the houses over there have water. The water combines with Bayou St. Claire over there, then pushes away here, since it's so saturated since inland is pushing into it, so it keeps feeding into here," her neighbor Regan Brock said.
Brock showed KATC his backyard, which he referred to as Lake Brock. He says it has not seen that much water since 2016.
"When the big flood happened, the water came up about to where the porch ends right here. We could see the water here. So a little less than then, but almost the same effect," Brock explained, pointing to the patio bricks.
Murphy echoes her neighbor.
"I didn't think after the flood of 2016 I would see this again," Murphy said.
She hopes something can be done to prevent her road from flooding.
"I think they could come put some dirt so grass can grow, and then it could prevent it from going into the street," she added.
Brock tells KATC he expects to see the high water for the next two weeks.
"This whole area hyper-saturates and the water doesn't go anywhere," said Brock. "Now we have to wait about two weeks for this to dry with the sunlight."
