'Flat water' state lives up to name

Most years, it's difficult for the casual Nebraskan to understand how the state got its name -- from some Native American words meaning "Flat Water."

Not this year. The natives were probably referring to the state's main aquatic artery, the Platte River, but northeast and eastern Nebraska, especially, are living up to the name.

The ground is so saturated by recent rains that there is nowhere for the water to go, other than down creeks and tributaries that are normally dry or running only at a trickle.

Three railroaders were caught on a collapsing railroad bridge near Norfolk; one of them has not yet been found. Hundreds of homes have been destroyed or damaged, along with hundreds of bridges and many miles of roads.

The wheat harvest in Kansas has been halted because of the rains, and a train narrowly missed falling into a river in that state, thanks to the crew being able to stop before a bridge completely collapsed.

Southwest Nebraska is also pretty well saturated, with McCook about an inch above normal for precipitation.

While the most recent drought is still fresh in our minds, so is the 1935 Republican River flood, which was recently recounted in several stories on these pages around its 75th anniversary, May 31.

Thankfully, that type of deluge should never be repeated, thanks to flood control and irrigation dams championed by Gazette founder Harry Strunk and others during the years following the flood.

It's just another reminder that we need to take the long view when it comes to water, whether it's sharing the Republican River with our neighbor to the south, diverting it or pumping it from the ground to irrigate our crops, or making sure it isn't allowed to go on a destructive rampage.