Today is the 50th anniversary of Hurricane Agnes. After 6 days of rain, the levees failed and water poured in from the Susquehanna River. The Wyoming Valley was evacuated. The river eventually crested at just over 40 feet. Thousands of businesses and homes were ruined and over 100thousand people were forced to flee. After the rain stopped and the flood waters receded, the Wyoming Valley was a muddy mess. State and federal officials visited the devastation, including then President Richard Nixon who called it "the greatest natural disaster in the history of the United States". The area received millions of dollars in aid to rebuild.Since then three feet of additional protection has been added to the levee greatly reducing the chance of such an event happening again.