Submerged Pilings of the Woodland Resort, Devils Lake

Submerged wooden pilings and debris from Woodland Resort remain in Devils Lake, North Dakota at dusk.
Submerged wooden pilings and debris from Woodland Resort remain in Devils Lake, North Dakota at dusk.

Devils Lake has risen more than 25 feet since the early 1990s, flooding thousands of acres of farmland, roads, and shoreline development across Ramsey and Benson counties. The Woodland Resort, once a lakeside destination with cabins and a public beach, was among the properties lost to the rising water. What remains are rows of dead trees and wooden pilings standing in water that now covers the former resort grounds. Devils Lake is a closed-basin lake with no natural outlet, meaning its water level depends entirely on precipitation and runoff rather than drainage to a river system, which has made its flooding especially difficult to predict or control.

Taken July 2015

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