Hydropower supply in Midwest, Plains ample despite drought

The drought worsened this week in the Midwest and the Plains, but the region's hydroelectric power has not diminished because abundant 2011 rain and snow filled reservoirs.

By Nati Harnik, AP

Dried corn stalks in a field in Yutan, Neb., on July 31.

By Nati Harnik, AP

Dried corn stalks in a field in Yutan, Neb., on July 31.

Nearly a quarter of the U.S. is enduring "extreme" to "exceptional" drought, according to the weekly U.S. Drought Monitor released Thursday by the National Drought Mitigation Center. That's the highest percentage in those categories since record-keeping began in 2000. The entire states of Arizona, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Colorado are in drought.

But hydroelectric power generated by six big dams on the Missouri River in the Dakotas and Montana was 12% above normal, providing enough electricity in July to power 90,000 homes for a year, says Mike Swenson, Missouri River power production team leader for the U.S. Corps of Engineers in Omaha.

The corps increased flow out of the dams to maintain enough water for navigation on the river from Gavins Point Dam in South Dakota to where the Missouri joins the Mississippi River at St. Louis, and the higher flows led to increased power production, he says.

"If it continues to be dry like this into the fall, then once we get into the next year, we will start to see some reductions," he says.

Buck Feist, a spokesman for the Bureau of Reclamation's Great Plains regional office, which oversees 79 reservoirs and 20 hydroelectric plants in nine states from Texas to Canada, says "reservoirs are working pretty much as they were designed — to store water to see you through these drought areas."

Overall demand for U.S. electricity did not hit an all-time high in July, despite temperatures that made it the hottest month on record in the USA. That's largely because of conservation practices and a soft economy, Edison Electric Institute spokesman Jim Owen says.

"Power demands are always higher in the summer when it is hot," he says, but "demand has been a little bit soft overall for the last couple of years for one basic, fundamental reason: Even though the economy has improved a little bit, it is still a little soft around the edges."

Peak demand so far in 2012 for the nine states that are all or partially served by the Little Rock-based Southwest Power Pool (SPP) was 53,690 megawatts on July 31, more than 1,000 megawatts below the Aug 2, 2011, peak.

SPP spokesman Pete Hoelscher says that power company officials are closely monitoring river levels for hydropower impact. If the heat persists, he says, demand for power could surge later this month when schools begin classes.

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Thousands of fish die as Midwest streams heat up

LINCOLN, Neb. – Thousands of fish are dying in the Midwest as the hot, dry summer dries up rivers and causes water temperatures to climb in some spots to nearly 100 degrees.

By Nati Harnik, AP

Dead fish float in a drying pond near Rock Port, Mo., in July. Multitudes of fish are dying in the Midwest as the sizzling summer dries up rivers and raises water temperatures in some spots to nearly 100 degrees.

By Nati Harnik, AP

Dead fish float in a drying pond near Rock Port, Mo., in July. Multitudes of fish are dying in the Midwest as the sizzling summer dries up rivers and raises water temperatures in some spots to nearly 100 degrees.

About 40,000 shovelnose sturgeon were killed in Iowa last week as water temperatures reached 97 degrees. Nebraska fishery officials said they've seen thousands of dead sturgeon, catfish, carp, and other species in the Lower Platte River, including the endangered pallid sturgeon.

And biologists in Illinois said the hot weather has killed tens of thousands of large- and smallmouth bass and channel catfish and is threatening the population of the greater redhorse fish, a state-endangered species.

So many fish died in one Illinois lake that the carcasses clogged an intake screen near a power plant, lowering water levels to the point that the station had to shut down one of its generators.

"It's something I've never seen in my career, and I've been here for more than 17 years," said Mark Flammang, a fisheries biologist with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. "I think what we're mainly dealing with here are the extremely low flows and this unparalleled heat."

The fish are victims of one of the driest and warmest summers in history. The federal U.S. Drought Monitor shows nearly two-thirds of the lower 48 states are experiencing some form of drought, and the Department of Agriculture has declared more than half of the nation's counties — nearly 1,600 in 32 states — as natural disaster areas.

More than 3,000 heat records were broken over the last month.

Iowa DNR officials said the sturgeon found dead in the Des Moines River were worth nearly $10 million, a high value based in part on their highly sought eggs, which are used for caviar. The fish are valued at more than $110 a pound.

Gavin Gibbons, a spokesman for the National Fisheries Institute, said the sturgeon kills don't appear to have reduced the supply enough to hurt regional caviar suppliers.

Flammang said weekend rain improved some of Iowa's rivers and lakes, but temperatures were rising again and straining a sturgeon population that develops health problems when water temperatures climb into the 80s.

"Those fish have been in these rivers for thousands of thousands of years, and they're accustomed to all sorts of weather conditions," he said. "But sometimes, you have conditions occur that are outside their realm of tolerance."

In Illinois, heat and lack of rain has dried up a large swath of Aux Sable Creek, the state's largest habitat for the endangered greater redhorse, a large bottom-feeding fish, said Dan Stephenson, a biologist with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources.

"We're talking hundreds of thousands (killed), maybe millions by now," Stephenson said. "If you're only talking about game fish, it's probably in the thousands. But for all fish, it's probably in the millions if you look statewide."

Stephenson said fish kills happen most summers in small private ponds and streams, but the hot weather this year has made the situation much worse.

"This year has been really, really bad — disproportionately bad, compared to our other years," he said.

Stephenson said a large number of dead fish were sucked into an intake screen near Powerton Lake in central Illinois, lowering water levels and forcing a temporary shutdown at a nearby power plant.

A spokesman for Edison International, which runs the coal-fired plant, said workers shut down one of its two generators for several hours two weeks ago because of extreme heat and low water levels at the lake, which is used for cooling.

In Nebraska, a stretch of the Platte River from Kearney in the central part of the state to Columbus in the east has gone dry and killed a "significant number" of sturgeon, catfish and minnows, said fisheries program manager Daryl Bauer. Bauer said the warm, shallow water has also killed an unknown number of endangered pallid sturgeon.

"It's a lot of miles of river, and a lot of fish," Bauer said. "Most of those fish are barely identifiable. In this heat, they decay really fast."

Bauer said a single dry year usually isn't enough to hurt the fish population. But he worries dry conditions in Nebraska could continue, repeating a stretch in the mid-2000s that weakened fish populations.

Kansas also has seen declining water levels that pulled younger, smaller game fish away from the vegetation-rich shore lines and forced them to cluster, making them easier targets for predators, said fisheries chief Doug Nygren of the Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism.

Nygren said he expects a drop in adult walleye populations in the state's shallower, wind-swept lakes in southern Kansas. But he said other species, such as large-mouth bass, can tolerate the heat and may multiply faster without competition from walleye.

"These last two years are the hottest we've ever seen," Nygren said. "That really can play a role in changing populations, shifting it in favor of some species over others. The walleye won't benefit from these high-water temperatures, but other species that are more tolerant may take advantage of their declining population."

Geno Adams, a fisheries program administrator in South Dakota, said there have been reports of isolated fish kills in its manmade lakes on the Missouri River and others in the eastern part of the state. But it's unclear how much of a role the heat played in the deaths.

One large batch of carp at Lewis and Clark Lake in the state's southeast corner had lesions, a sign they were suffering from a bacterial infection. Adams said the fish are more prone to sickness with low water levels and extreme heat. But he added that other fish habitat have seen a record number this year thanks to the 2011 floods.

"When we're in a drought, there's a struggle for water and it's going in all different directions," Adams said. "Keeping it in the reservoir for recreational fisheries is not at the top of the priority list."

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Heat, power outages continue assault on East, Midwest

An unrelenting wave of stifling heat continued to blanket the East and Midwest on Monday as millions of people struggled without power for a third straight day.

By Parker Michels-Boyce, AP

A car crushed by a fallen tree on Carrington Road in Lynchburg, Va., on Sunday.

By Parker Michels-Boyce, AP

A car crushed by a fallen tree on Carrington Road in Lynchburg, Va., on Sunday.

About 2 million customers from North Carolina to New Jersey and as far west as Illinois were without power Monday morning. And utility officials said that for many the power would likely be out for several more days.

Since Friday, severe weather has been blamed for at least 22 deaths, most from trees falling on homes and cars. The culprit was a ferocious summer storm that cut a swath of destruction Friday night across 11 states, toppling trees, knocking out traffic lights, and sending thousands of people to shelters and into community pools to escape the heat.

The heat wave that began last week was expected to drive temperatures into the 100s from Indianapolis to Atlanta through the Fourth of July holiday.

The worst of the outages remained in the areas around Baltimore and Washington, D.C. To alleviate commuter congestion Monday, federal and state officials gave many workers the option of staying home. Federal agencies opened in Washington, but non-emergency employees had the option of taking leave or working from home. Maryland's governor also gave state workers wide leeway for staying out of the office.

Heat warnings have been issued for parts of Alabama, Florida, the Carolinas, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri and Ohio. In St. Louis, the National Weather Service warned of "dangerous heat" as temperatures climb to 106 degrees on Monday.

State public health officials have issued a boil-water advisory for all of West Virginia, where Environmental Health Services Director Barbara Taylor said statewide power outages related to the Friday night storm have put many water supplies at risk, and the advisory will remain in effect until further notice.

Since a storm pushed a tree through the roof of her Beckley, W.Va., home, Emma Patrick, says she's been living with a tangle of electrical wires. "These electrical wires are all in my house, all in my roof, all over the doors," Patrick says. "I am 91 years old with cancer. I am terrified to move around. I don't know if these wires are live or dead."

"The electric company is saying; 'You just have to wait.' I have been calling and calling and calling and these people act like they just do not care."

In Ohio, about 445,000 residents and businesses were without power in the aftermath of the state's worst storm since 2008, when it was battered by the remnants of Hurricane Ike. About 200 National Guard members were going door-to-door in the Columbus and Dayton areas Monday to check on residents who might need help. Columbus planned to open fire hydrants to help residents cool off.

"It makes me remember what life was like when I was a kid," said Terry Ann Grove, 71 , buying ice, bread and peanut butter at one of a handful of open stores in Newark, Ohio. "It's worse now because we're used to air-conditioning and McDonald's any time you want it."

Grove spent a day with a daughter who had power in Columbus, 45 minutes away, but returned to be home even though power wasn't expected until this weekend. "That's what porches are for, I guess," she said.

In nearby Granville, nobody had electricity, except for a few emergency generators. Denison University closed and sent students home. However, the village's four-day July Fourth fair was scheduled to start Wednesday -- with or without power -- powered by generators supplied by the amusement ride company.

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell declared a state of emergency, saying the storms caused the most widespread, non-hurricane-related power outage in that state's history. A wastewater treatment plant in Lynchburg lost power and discharged at least 250,000 gallons of water into the James River.

"This is not a one-day situation," McDonnell said. "It is a multiday challenge."

With no power at his home, barista Morgan Smith has been sleeping on the floor of Market Street Coffee in rural Purcellville, Va., for the last two nights. The store - which never lost power - is one of the few places in the western Loudoun County town with free wifi, and Monday morning, was busy with people charging cell phones and typing on laptops.

"People have been very flustered," Smith said. "Exhausted."

In the shop, Anna Novaes of nearby Lovettsville caught up on work while her daughter, Anna Luiza Mendonca, used her own laptop to take an online English class. The family lost power Friday night, and utility NOVEC forecast the outage would last until Tuesday afternoon.

"We've had to be creative," Novaes said. "We've been sleeping in the basement because it's fresher and cooler down there. And we've been going to the gym to take showers."

John Swift who lost power at his home in a suburb of Richmond, Va., toughed out the power outage without complaint. The heat, he said, was the "biggest nuisance."

"I've got a camp stove. I've got cold showers. I don't watch TV. It's not a big deal," said Swift, 60.

Already, the heat wave has "broken hundreds of daily records and quite a few all-time records," said Weather Service meteorologist Katie LaBelle. "The heat is actually a very significant threat, especially with all the power outages. Coming behind that storm, with all the damage it caused, reacting to the heat is a high priority, making sure people can find cool places while they wait for the power to come back on."

Weekend temperatures topped 109 in Georgia, the Carolinas, Tennessee and Kentucky. Meteorologists in Jacksonville said the combination of 100-degree temperatures and high humidity there made it feel like 118.

Some states declared emergencies and activated disaster-response agencies. Governors in New Jersey and Ohio called out the National Guard.

Officials focused on the most vulnerable residents: children, the sick and the elderly.

In Washington, D.C., officials canceled summer school for Monday as they continued to assess storm damage. The city opened libraries and recreation centers and extended the hours at community pools to give residents without power respite from the heat. The city dispatched National Guard troops to powerless intersections to direct traffic and keep people away from debris and downed power lines.

Maryland opened 74 cooling stations to help residents cope with the heat and was canvassing hospitals and nursing homes to ensure they have enough power to keep elderly and sick residents cool, Maryland Emergency Management Agency spokesman Ed McDonough said. The number of people without power is similar to power outages following hurricanes, he said.

"That's still an awful lot of people without power in the extreme heat we're having now," McDonough said. "It's still an event that's going to take days instead of hours. We didn't have the kind of warning you have with hurricane so they couldn't stage repair crews ahead of time."

In western Pennsylvania, power had been restored to 95% of the 63,000 customers who suffered outages during the storm. The rest were expected to have electricity back late Monday.

Contributing: Gary Strauss, Anthony DeBarros and Natalie DiBlasio in McLean, Va., Dennis Cauchon in Ohio and the Associated Press

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While Midwest and East bake, Northwest could see some flakes

The unofficial start to summer will kick off with blazing heat across most of the eastern half of the country this Memorial Day weekend.

By Laurie Skrivan, AP

Lifeguard Sam McCabe of cleans off the water slide at an aquatic center in Maplewood, Mo., on Thursday in preparation for the Memorial Day holiday weekend. Residents across the Midwest and East might be dealing with record-setting heat during the holiday weekend.

By Laurie Skrivan, AP

Lifeguard Sam McCabe of cleans off the water slide at an aquatic center in Maplewood, Mo., on Thursday in preparation for the Memorial Day holiday weekend. Residents across the Midwest and East might be dealing with record-setting heat during the holiday weekend.

Temperatures will soar into the 90s as far north as Illinois. Chicago could hit 100 degrees on Sunday.

Elsewhere, a pesky, windy storm could ruin beach plans along the Southeast coast, while parts of the Northwest deal with light snow and chilly weather.

July in May: Hot and humid conditions will be the rule in the southern Plains, Mississippi Valley, Great Lakes, Ohio Valley, the Mid-Atlantic and the Southeast all three days of this holiday weekend. High temperatures in the 90s will be widespread from Texas to Maryland.

Cities such as Memphis, Louisville, Little Rock and St. Louis could all break temperature records. The Indianapolis 500 could be run in record heat on Sunday.

The worst of the heat isn't expected to make it into the Northeast and New England, however, where temperatures in the 70s and 80s are likely.

Soggy Southeast: Just like last weekend's Tropical Storm Alberto, another slow-moving storm will meander around the Southeast coast this weekend, potentially bringing bands of rain, gusty winds and rough surf. The storm may become tropical, and it would receive the name Beryl.

Other than the ruined outdoor plans, the rain will be welcome across the drought-plagued states of Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas.

Wintry West, severe North: Some parts of the northern Rockies and Northwest will be in the 40s and 50s this weekend. Some snow is possible at higher elevations.

Severe storms could rattle the upper Midwest through the weekend as cooler air clashes with the unusual heat.

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Freezing rain, snow cover parts of Upper Midwest (AP)

MINNEAPOLIS – Freezing drizzle and rain made roads slick Sunday as a winter weather system moved across portions of the Upper Midwest, and the precipitation was expected to begin changing over into snow that could continue into Monday.

The National Weather Service issued winter weather advisories for most of Minnesota and South Dakota, nearly all of Wisconsin and parts of North Dakota and Iowa for late Sunday.

The precipitation was coming from a low pressure system expected to track east across Nebraska and Iowa and deepen as it moved northeast across Wisconsin, it said.

Snow was expected Sunday in Nebraska and the Dakotas with a few inches falling in parts before midnight, the weather service said.

In other states, rain was changing to snow and was expected to continue into Monday morning. Up to 2 inches of snow were possible by Monday in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota and parts of central Wisconsin, the weather service said.

In southeastern Minnesota, Rochester police responded to more than 70 crashes on slick roadways Sunday morning, Lt. Mike Sadauskis said.

"People probably need to take their time a little bit better, give themselves a little bit more space," he said.

In northwestern Minnesota, four people were injured in a two-car crash on an icy Interstate 94 just east of Moorhead on Sunday morning, the State Patrol reported, while a woman was injured when the car she was riding in lost control near a crash scene and slid into the rear of a parked fire truck on I-94 near Rothsay.

A teenager escaped injury when his SUV slid on an icy road and hit a snowplow Sunday morning on U.S. Highway 2 east of Wilton in Beltrami County. The snowplow driver was also unhurt.

Authorities closed Interstate 43 in both directions south of Green Bay, Wis. for over two hours after light rain turned to ice and made travel dangerous, leading to multiple crashes, the Wisconsin Department of Transportation said.

Glazing was reported Sunday across portions of northeastern Iowa and southwestern and central Wisconsin, the weather service said. In the Milwaukee area, freezing fog could reduce visibility to less than a quarter of a mile, it said.

North Dakota got freezing rain and snow Saturday into Sunday that left roads in the southern half of the state coated with ice.

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Strong winds whip up waves, down trees in Midwest (Reuters)

James Kelleher

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A gusty cold front sweeping into the Midwest from Canada triggered gale, rip current and shoreline flood warnings along Lake Michigan on Friday and whipped up waves as high a 23 feet, the National Weather Service said.

Areas of North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and adjoining parts of Canada - were buffeted by winds as high a 70 miles an hour and downed trees, knocked out power and prompted the closure of waterfront parks in several states.

In Wisconsin's Door County, a picturesque peninsula that juts out into northern Lake Michigan popular this time of year with tourists seeking fall color, all state parks and trails were closed until next week. The state's Department of Natural Resources said this was because of closed roads, downed trees and unsafe conditions.

No injuries were reported.

"We have all available local crews at work clearing roads and more help is on the way," said Dan Schuller, director of the DNR's Wisconsin State Parks and Trails system.

"We are concentrating on damage assessment and clearing of roads to campgrounds and other high use areas. Campers currently in the parks are being asked to leave ... We will reopen all properties as soon as they can be declared safe for visitors."

Chicago lived up to its nickname as the "Windy City" on Friday as huge swells forced the closure of the city's 18.5 mile lakefront bike and running path.

Mark Bardou, a meteorologist with in the Chicago bureau of the NWS, said some of the strongest winds associated with the storm were measured over the Great Lakes, where gusts neared 65 knots an hour, about 75 miles an hour, and buoys in the middle of the lake measured swells as high as 23 feet.

(Editing by Greg McCune)

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Forecasters warn of possible severe Midwest weather (Reuters)

By James B. Kelleher James B. Kelleher – Tue Aug 23, 11:48 am ET

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Forecasters on Tuesday warned residents of much of the Upper Midwest to brace for possibly severe afternoon weather as a cluster of powerful thunderstorms swept east and south out of Minnesota and Iowa.

The National Weather Service issued severe weather outlooks for parts of Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin and Illinois, including Chicago, and warned the dangers could include the possibility of isolated tornadoes in some areas.

"There's more than one system, but they're very tightly packed," said Rich Thompson, lead forecaster at the National Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.

"There are some pretty strong storms out there."

In Wisconsin, where a twister touched down west of Green Bay late last week, killing one man and causing major damage, forecasters said strong storms were expected to bring "torrential rainfall and moderately severe hail" from Rhinelander south to Marinette.

The impending storm forced the Green Bay Packers football team to move its practice indoors.

Forecasters at the NWS said thunderstorms expected to sweep through the Chicago area this afternoon and evening could produce damaging winds in excess of 60 miles per hour, quarter-sized hail, drenching rains and frequent cloud to ground lightning.

(Editing by Jerry Norton)

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Thunderstorms threaten the Mid-Atlantic and Midwest (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Much of the Mid-Atlantic braced on Friday for a round of strong thunderstorms to pelt the region with heavy rainfall, gusty winds and lightning, forecasters said.

Parts of eastern Pennsylvania, much of New Jersey and areas of Maryland and Delaware were under flash flood watches through the evening hours, according to the National Weather Service.

"There's the potential for the storms to produce heavy rain," said Kristin Kline, NWS meteorologist in Mt. Holly, New Jersey. "They are slow-moving and with the already saturated grounds ... there could be some problems with flash flooding."

The storms were expected to move through later in the day and soak the region with one half to one inch of rain, with the threat of more in some localized areas, NWS said.

With a likely break from the rain on Saturday, a new threat of thunderstorms and showers was forecast to emerge on Sunday, said AccuWeather.com senior meteorologist Paul Walker.

Parts of the Midwest would likely see blistering winds and hail as strong thunderstorms were predicted Friday.

Walker said he could not rule out the possibility of an isolated tornado given the stormy weather expected in Kansas and central Nebraska.

Damaging storms swept through the region pummeling Omaha, Nebraska and Kansas City, Missouri with large hail Thursday night, according to AccuWeather.com.

The severe weather shut down Omaha's Eppley Airfield and hail damaged at least seven aircraft during the storm that brought nearly two inches of rain and wind gusts around 70mph.

Such extreme conditions haven't spared other parts of the country this week.

A wall of dust engulfed Phoenix Thursday, cutting visibility and delaying flights at the international airport.

Huge sand storms dubbed "haboobs" occur often in the sweltering summer monsoon season in the southwest United States.

But it is high humidity and a 6,000-acre fire in southeastern Virginia that are combining to create what officials are calling a "super fog."

A mixture of water vapor and smoke blanketed roads and interstates and wreaked havoc for motorists, Catherine Hibbard, spokeswoman for an interagency team fighting the fire in the Great Dismal Swamp, said on Friday.

A force of 433 firefighters is battling the fire, which is 15 percent contained. Authorities predict the fire will continue burning until significant rain comes or high temperatures drop.

Virginia's Environmental Quality Department issued an air quality code red -- the second highest -- for certain areas, advising mild health effects for the general public and more serious health problems for sensitive groups.

(Additional reporting by Lauren Keiper in Boston; Matthew Ward in Chesapeake, Virginia; Tim Gaynor in Phoenix; and David Hendee in Omaha; Editing by Ellen Wulfhorst and Jerry Norton)

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Rare, Severe 'Derecho' Windstorm Hits Midwest (LiveScience.com)

A severe storm is sweeping across the Midwest today with winds so strong that it has a special name: derecho.

A derecho (from the Spanish adverb for "straight") is a long-lived windstorm that forms in a straight line — unlike the swirling winds of a tornado — and is associated with what's known as a bow echo, a line of severe thunderstorms. The term "derecho" was first used over a century ago to describe a storm in Iowa. Across the United States, there are generally one to three derecho events each year.

The Midwest derecho has wind gusts between 60 and 80 mph (97 to 129 kph), according to the Weather Channel. Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan and Illinois have all reported severe winds. These severe winds are the main cause of damage from the storm, said Rose Sengenberger, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Romeoville, Ill., but added that people should be on the lookout for other dangerous weather.

"With any long-lived storm, there is also the threat of lightning and heavy rain," Sengenberger told OurAmazingPlanet.

Tornadoes are not any more likely during a derecho, Sengenberger said. Still, the National Weather Service issued a tornado warning for parts of southwest Michigan. Dangerous rain-wrapped tornadoes could shoot down from the squall line, said the NWS. As their name suggests, rain-wrapped tornadoes are shrouded from view by pouring rains, making them even more potentially dangerous for their ability to surprise.

A derecho is not the worst of the windstorms, however. On May 8, 2009, a rare windstorm that swept across Kansas, Missouriand Illinois was in a league of its own. An intense vortex and eyelike structure similar to what forms at the center of tropical storms and hurricanes appeared in the bow echo. The storm was so severe that it earned a brand-new name: super derecho.

The super derecho gained strength as it moved across Kansas in the early morning, spinning off 18 tornadoes and packing wind speeds from 70 to 90 mph (115 to 145 kph) when it hit Springfield, Mo. The super derecho plowed a path of destruction through the state about 100 miles (62 kilometers) wide, crossed the Mississippi River with 90 to 100 mph (145 to 160 kph) wind gusts and blew through Illinois before dissipating at that state's eastern border.

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Soggy Midwest faces new summer threat: more rain (AP)

ALAN SCHER ZAGIER and DAVE KOLPACK, Associated Press Alan Scher Zagier And Dave Kolpack, Associated Press – Thu Jun 23, 3:00 pm ET

MINOT, N.D. – The reservoirs are full. The dams are open wide. The rivers have already climbed well beyond their banks. Throughout the Missouri River Valley and other parts of the upper Midwest, there's simply no place left for any more water.

That brings a new threat to the nation's water-logged midsection: more rain. In a region already struggling with historically high water, the return of heavy storms could intensify the flooding and turn a soggy summer into a tragic one for a dozen states that drain into the Missouri.

"We know what's coming down the river, and what's going to continue to come down the river," said meteorologist Wes Browning of the National Weather Service office in St. Louis. "But what we don't know with any certitude, beyond five to seven days, is the amount of rainfall. That's really going to drive this flood."

The peril began unfolding during the spring, when storms dumped an unexpectedly large amount of rain across Montana. That precipitation, combined with unusually heavy snowmelt, caused a vast volume of water to build up behind dams in the United States and Canada.

The Army Corps of Engineers and Canadian authorities have been releasing water through those dams for weeks, inundating many low-lying, mostly rural parts of Iowa, Nebraska, Missouri and North and South Dakota. Now the river valley is saturated, and the arrival of any more water could create an even larger disaster.

Many people expect to spend an anxious summer watching the skies and monitoring forecasts.

Terry Higedick, who farms 2,500 acres in central Missouri's Boone and Cole counties, has had plenty of time to prepare. He sold his excess corn and soybeans or put them in a grain elevator. His heavy equipment has been moved to higher ground.

But despite daily updates on dam releases and sophisticated forecasts, he has few reliable ways to estimate how much rain will fall over the next few months — or how high the floodwaters will rise.

"It makes it impossible to plan," he said. "We're kind of stuck in that mode."

In Minot, the danger came from the Souris River, a little-known channel that flows south from Canada without entering the Missouri River basin. On Thursday, crews worked furiously to raise earthen levees in a last-ditch effort to protect at least some neighborhoods, even as officials acknowledged they could not prevent significant damage to North Dakota's fourth-largest city.

The workers on the levee and National Guard troops were the only people to be seen in the endangered areas. As many as 10,000 residents, or about one-fourth of Minot's population, evacuated ahead of the community's worst flooding in four decades.

Thursday's effort also focused on protecting critical infrastructure, including sewer and water service. If those utilities were to be knocked out by floodwaters, more evacuations could be necessary. Parts of the city were already under several feet of water, including a trailer park near the river.

The weather service's Climate Prediction Center issued its three-month outlook for rain on June 16. Above-normal rain was anticipated over a large swath of the Great Plains covering much of the Dakotas, Iowa and Nebraska.

In the worst-case scenario, that rain would gush into the already full river system and produce widespread, near-record flooding from Kansas City to St. Louis.

A case in point: a mere 2 to 3 inches of rain last week in northern Missouri pushed the Mississippi River up 6 feet within days near Hannibal. In Minot, the Souris is expected to top a city record set in 1881 by more than 5 feet.

Flood projections in Missouri are similarly dire. In the state capital of Jefferson City, for instance, the predicted crests of 6 feet to 14 feet above flood stage would wash out roads, breach levees, close railroads, threaten power plant operations and shut down major highways. Experts can't say with certainty if water levels will rise that high, but are warning residents to be prepared.

Right now, those projections are simply "good long-range planning information," Browning said. "From this point on, it depends on what's coming out of the sky."

And the threat looms not just in the amount of rain but also its intensity. A half-inch of rain every day for a week would be far different than a severe thunderstorm that dumped 5 inches of rain in a few hours.

Browning compared the two scenarios to a homeowner watering his lawn.

"I could take two approaches. I could take out a sprinkler overnight with a nice steady, slow stream and nothing would go down the curb," he said. "Or I could do it with a fire hose in five minutes. I would get an inch of water in both cases. But the runoff into the gutter would be far more with the fire hose."

In Minot, the city already endured a major evacuation last month, when the Souris rose briefly to threatening levels. Though residents had been warned that another evacuation was possible, the river's second rise after heavy weekend rains shocked many people, including city officials.

"It's just an unprecedented amount of rainfall this spring in the whole basin," said Mark Davidson, a spokesman for the army corps in St. Paul., Minn. "We're all doing our best, but Mother Nature, she's just tough."

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Associated Press Writer Doug Glass in Minneapolis contributed to this report.

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Zagier reported from Columbia, Mo. He can be reached at http://twitter.com/azagier.

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