The Battle Below: King County Races to Shore Up Stressed Levees After Historic Rains
The relentless series of atmospheric rivers that hammered Western Washington has brought to light a growing and urgent problem simmering beneath the region’s feet: an aging and increasingly vulnerable network of river levees. While much of King County is focused on immediate cleanup, officials are locked in a tense race to monitor and repair critical segments that are being pushed to their breaking point by saturated ground and punishing river flows.
The alarm bells are ringing loudest along the Green River, a vital waterway flowing through the county’s industrial heartland. The recent failure of the Desimone Levee in Tukwila forced immediate “Go Now” evacuation orders for residents and businesses in parts of Renton, Kent, and Auburn, underscoring the severity of the threat. A car-sized chunk of the levee was washed away by the floodwaters, highlighting the structural distress caused by days of torrential downpours.
While crews have been working around the clock, dropping massive, gravel-filled nylon bags into the breach for a temporary fix, the long-term prognosis for key flood defenses remains concerning. John Taylor, the director of King County’s Department of Natural Resources, has voiced particular worry over several other Green River levees. The list of high-priority sites includes the Somes Dolan Levee and the Signature Pointe Levee near Kent, as well as the Nursing Home Levee, also located in the Kent area. These are critical sections where constant monitoring is now the norm, with spotters walking the length of the embankments looking for any signs of seepage.
The challenge stems from a combination of historic weather and outdated infrastructure. Many of King County’s levees were originally constructed in the 1960s or even earlier, and a number of these aging systems simply do not meet the stricter design standards required today.
This vulnerability is compounded by the enormous volumes of water moving through the river systems. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers manages major flood control structures like the Howard Hanson Dam on the Green River, which typically mitigates historical flood magnitudes. However, the sheer duration and intensity of the recent storms have forced dam releases that, combined with unrelenting rainfall, saturate the levee banks, leading to a dangerous buildup of pressure.
The situation along the White River has also seen severe stress. A separate levee failure in the city of Pacific led to another urgent evacuation call, submerging Pacific City Park in a firehouse-sized spray of water.
Emergency repairs are ongoing across the region. However, a major repair project for the Desimone Levee, which suffered previous damage in 2020, is not anticipated to be completed until 2031, illustrating the years-long planning and funding challenges inherent in fixing these complex flood systems. Until then, emergency measures and constant vigilance from county crews and the deployed Washington National Guard will be all that stands between rising waters and the communities that rely on these vital earthen walls.
As the weather shifts, the immediate crisis may ebb, but the long-term questions about the resilience and funding for this essential infrastructure will undoubtedly flow on.