Danielle Lindoff discusses surviving historic Alaskan flooding: 'It was coming in like faucets through every doorway'

When the Mendenhall River waters began to dramatically rise on Aug. 6, Danielle Lindoff and husband Kamal were prepared yet hopeful. The jökulhlaups — an Icelandic word for glacial lake outburst floods — had largely left their property untouched over the years, with the Natural Resources Conservation Service recently determining in a neighborhood study that their land near the river wasn't in danger of erosion.

"Every year we watched the river rise and fall, rise and fall. It was never even to the point where it got up to where it was even on our property," Danielle shared in the phone conversation with The Cool Down in September, explaining how no one had discussed the jökulhlaups with her family when they moved into their Juneau, Alaska, home in 2012.

Jökulhlaups were unusual on the Mendenhall before 2011, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. However, like other critical glaciers around the world, those in the Juneau area are melting at an accelerated rate. In August, a glacial outburst would cause historic flooding, with the river surging to an unprecedented 15.99 feet just one year after it set the previous record at 14.92 feet.

In 2023, the flood resulted in some water entering the Lindoffs' garage, according to Danielle, even though her house was many feet up and away from the river. Thankfully, her family escaped damage to their living areas — despite the fact that they were out of town and couldn't take mitigation measures. (Their neighbors moved some items from the water-soaked garage.)

"They've always been saying the 100-year flood event is coming," Danielle told The Cool Down. "So we were like, 'OK, well, that happened,' and we were really lucky."

Nevertheless, when Danielle and Kamal received a warning that the basin had begun flooding this summer, they sprang into action, positioning sandbags along their property, adding temporary waterproofing to their doorways, and moving items to higher levels.

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Despite doing everything they reasonably could, though, their preparations were no match for the Mendenhall River, which completely overtook their home and made the escape treacherous as Kamal swam to their nearby boat and came back for Danielle as she left through a window.

"Basically, our house was just part of the river. … It was coming in like faucets through every doorway," Danielle told The Cool Down, explaining that the rapidly flowing river carried dangerous debris and rammed a large log into the garage, allowing water to pour in more freely.

The trail of destruction left the Lindoffs and more than 300 other households in Juneau turning to one another for support through town meetings and resources like GoFundMe, which had helped raise more than $200,000 for those impacted by the Juneau flood and deadly landslides in Ketchikan by early September, according to an email from the company.

🗣️ What would you do if natural disasters were threatening your home?

🔘 Move somewhere else 🌎

🔘 Reinforce my home 🏠

🔘 Nothing 🤷

🔘 This is happening already 😬

🗳️ Click your choice to see results and speak your mind

"I'm so thankful that my sister was like, 'I'm going to start you a GoFundMe,' because we wouldn't have had anything besides our regular income to cover all the things that needed to be done," Danielle told The Cool Down, explaining that she was hesitant to publicly ask for help but the crowdfunding platform has provided crucial support.

As Danielle shared, she felt a sense of urgency to safely and securely restore her home as soon as possible, updating the patio entrance to a double storm door, investing in flood gates, and considering other mitigation measures like an aquadam. She added that she and Kamal, who is Tlingit and a Tlingit & Haida tribal citizen, were also very grateful for significant help from the T&H emergency operations team.

For Danielle, restoring the lower level was particularly important, as flare-ups of long-term rheumatoid arthritis, first diagnosed at 18 months old, have affected her mobility.

"That level of the house, that was my area. That's where I could navigate in my own home without pain or assistance," Danielle told The Cool Down. "To have yet another thing come in and try to take away my independence has been hard. … I look at those stairs, and it's like a tunnel that doesn't end."

Beyond the continued financial support from GoFundMe donations as recovery efforts continue, when asked how else to assist people in Alaska, Danielle spoke with empathy, revealing she felt it was important to raise awareness about how rising global temperatures are impacting communities both in the Last Frontier and around the world.

"Two full neighborhoods over … was completely underwater," Danielle told The Cool Down. "So people who had no idea or expectation that this flood could affect them lost everything."

Experts have connected a warming climate not only to melting glaciers but also to more intense extreme weather, including an increased risk of flooding and intense rainfall — as seen during an atmospheric river that contributed to the landslides in Ketchikan.

According to NASA, more than 100 years of scientific evidence indicates human activities are the primary cause of these rising temperatures, especially the burning of dirty fuels.

"It is all directly linked back to the changing of climate. Everybody across this nation has noticed either extreme weather or extreme things. ... Ours is the meltoff," Danielle told The Cool Down, reiterating that the floods from the Mendenhall were "never like this" in years past.

"So something changed," she added. "Whatever your reasons for saying it out loud, know that people are impacted everyday by changes in the climate. Maybe it's time to start thinking about the 'why' a little bit more."