Iowa River Crests, But Mississippi Rising

June 16, 2008 — -- The last time Cedar Rapids, Iowa resident Mark Meyers' wife and daughter saw their home; the view was from the bow of a rescue boat as floodwaters rose to the doorframes and window sills.

Meyer came home alone this weekend to assess the damage; his wife and daughter couldn't bear to make the trip.

"It is irreplaceable," Meyers told ABC News as he returned to his home.

There was so much mud in his home he could hardly get the front door open.

"I've been collecting this stuff with my wife for the last 30 years and it is all gone," he said as he pulled a sculpture of a horse out of the muck.

After more than a week of ferocious flooding along the Iowa and Mississippi Rivers, tragedies like Meyer's have become common. Already more than 36,000 Iowa residents have been evacuated and, with the cresting of the Mississippi River only days away, the numbers will only grow.

"It's likely that we will see major and serious flooding on every part of the southeastern border of our state," Iowa Gov. Chet Culver told The Associated Press.

"We are taking precautionary steps. We are evacuating where necessary, but that is going to be the next round here."

The National Guard has been called in to help several cities fortify their levees along the Mississippi with sandbags.

In Keokuk, Iowa, efforts are being made not only to protect the levee but, ironically, the city's water supply as well.

Experts say one of the relatively unknown consequences of massive flooding is the contamination of water storage and treatment plants. Several cities in Iowa have already asked businesses and homeowners to do what they can to conserve water to minimize the strain.

In Iowa City, home to the University of Iowa, the damage could have been worse, officials think, because of the massive loss of water from all the levees that broke upstream forcing the Iowa River to crest a bit earlier, but thankfully lower, than expected in Iowa City.

Despite a huge student sandbagging effort at University of Iowa, 16 buildings on the campus were flooded. About 5,000 of the the town's 60,000 residents were evacuated.