This time last year, Old Man River was quickly approaching the flood stage in the Queen City.
Even then, given the rate at which the flood stage was increasing, Mississippi Levee Board Chief Engineer Peter Nimrod didn’t anticipate any major issues as a result.
Fortunately, the same is the case this year and there lies even less of a chance of the Mississippi River reaching flood stage in the coming weeks.
“Right now in Greenville, we’re just below 43 feet and it’s predicted to get up to 45 feet in a week or crest on March 17,” Nimrod said. “And then, it looks like it’s going to drop a couple of feet down to the 42/43 range and stay there for 10 days.”
In roughly three weeks, if nothing else changes, Nimrod said he expects the river flood stage to start falling again.
His overall assessment of the flood stage in the coming weeks is that it looks good, considering all of the snow that accumulated up north has melted and rainfallsacross the valley doesn’t pose too much of a concern.
“Looks like what they call a normal flood year, which means you don’t quite get to the flood stage which is good and something we haven’t seen since 2015,” he said.
“The forecast looks really good — way better than we were a year ago by far,” Nimrod said. “That doesn’t mean everything will jump back up again but right now it looks pretty favorable. If 45 was as high as we got, I’d be thrilled.”
As for any impact, with the flood stage only reaching 45 feet, lower Lake Ferguson could possibly accumulate a foot of water on top of it, which is one of the roads used to access Lake Ferguson and its cabins.
However, Nimrod explained that lodgers would be able to drive one additional
mile north to upper Lake Ferguson Road, which typically doesn’t flood until a flood stage of 50 feet.
All in all, no access will be cut off due to the flood stage and no homes are at risk of flooding.
Slight access issues will likely be the most of flood stage impact.
“Warfield Point Park will be partially under water at 45 feet, but not much really,” Nimrod added. “So access to the park gets kind of off, but the park as a whole won’t be under water, which is great because that means when the water goes down, they can do a quick cleanup and be ready to go back to operations.”
The river cresting at three feet below flood stage level — 48 feet — is said to be a “good deal.”
