Tag Archives: flooding

Rivers may reach flood stage after warm weather, coming rainstorm

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From today’s Missoulian . . .

What do you get when you add two warm weekend days, an expected 80-degree high temperature for Monday, and a rainstorm that is expected to move into western Montana late Monday and stay through Wednesday?

A good chance that the Clark Fork, Bitterroot and Flathead rivers will be above flood stage by the middle to later half of the work week, said Corby Dickerson, meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Missoula.

“One of the things that is really challenging in advance of these storms is to fully gauge the impact of the heating and precipitation on our flood models,” Dickerson said. “As far as actual numbers and how high the rivers will get there are still a lot of questions.”

“However, given the scenario and time of year, we are shaping up to see a substantial rise in the rivers across Western Montana.”

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North Fork forecast at flood stage by mid-week at Canadian border

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The National Weather Service tweaked their forecast river levels for the North Fork Flathead River. They now show it cresting just above flood stage for about a day at the Canadian border in the Tuesday-Wednesday time-frame. It’s hard to know what will happen at Polebridge — the gauge seems to be broken again — but the river should at least be pretty close to bank-full by mid-week.

Use the links on the “Flood Information” page to monitor the situation.

Warm temperatures through Monday expected to bring rivers up

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From today’s Daily Inter Lake . . .

The National Weather Service is holding to its forecast for higher temperatures this weekend and for Western Montana rivers and streams to rise sharply in the early part of next week.

Temperatures are expected to reach the lower 70s today and the upper 70s or lowers 80s by Sunday and Monday.

It will be “the warmest temperatures we’ve certainly seen this year,” meteorologist Bruce Bauck said. “It’s going to take a couple of days for this warm weather to start melting this snow … We should see the rivers starting to jump up pretty good in the early part of the week.”…

Across the Flathead River Basin, the snow water content at higher-elevation sites is 226 percent of normal….

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Related news: Balmy weekend ahead for Glacier

Snow melting, dams filling, floods feared in West

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Here’s a pretty good overview of the potential flood situation in our corner of the the U.S. from today’s Flathead Beacon . . .

The giant concrete dams of the Pacific Northwest are overflowing with water. Wyoming has deployed National Guard troops to pile up sandbags. A federal official compares the impending situation to a bucking bull ready to storm out of his chute.

States across the West are bracing for major flooding in the coming weeks once a record mountain snowpack starts melting and sending water gushing into rivers, streams and low-lying communities. The catalyst will be warmer temperatures forecast for the next week that could set off a rapid thaw.

Continue reading . . .

Related article more specific to Montana: Schweitzer wants presidential disaster declaration

Larry Wilson: Rain hampering North Fork drivers

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Larry Wilson talks about the state of the river (tolerable so far) and the state of the North Fork Road (pretty bad, especially further north).

It may have been cold, wet, and nasty in the Flathead Valley this last week, but it was twice as nasty on the North Fork.

All in all, that has been a good thing for the river. Although the river is muddy and running nearly bank-full, there has been no flood damage. The threat of flooding is not over, merely postponed. There’s still a lot of snow in the high country, but I remain confident that we will not have major flooding unless we have heavy warm rain. The cold rain of the week is supposed to be replaced this week with warming temperatures and little rain. Hopefully, although the river will be high, we will have little damage.

The rain did have an affect on the North Fork Road…

Continue reading . . .

(Many roads in the Flathead National Forest are in rough shape, too. Call one of the ranger stations for the latest conditions: Hungry Horse/Glacier View at 387-3800, Tally Lake at 758-5204, Swan Lake at 837-7500 and Spotted Bear at 758-5376.)

Flooding roller coaster ride continues

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It looks like the flooding roller coaster ride will continue, with river levels dropping for a short time and then rising again by the end of the week. This is reflected in the forecast river levels for the North Fork, which show a slight decrease for the next day or two followed by a steady rise to just at or above flood stage by the end of the week at Polebridge and the Canadian border.

From the Missoulian . . .

Rivers and streams in western Montana were in the recede mode Saturday as cool weather persisted and some expected precipitation failed to materialize…

With warmer weather and rain predicted by midweek, and a good stock of snow still waiting in the mountains, “we’ll probably have most of the rivers going right back up,” said Mark Loeffelbein of the National Weather Service in Missoula.

Continue reading . . .

Record rain but no real flooding yet in Flathead Valley

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High altitude snowpack is still not melting and, in some places, still accumulating, keeping everyone in suspense. The Daily Inter Lake has a good summary of the situation . . .

Record precipitation was recorded in the Flathead Valley and at higher elevations Thursday, but cool weather is likely to halt snow melt and keep local rivers in check for now, according to the National Weather Service in Missoula.

The bad news is that record snowpack at higher elevations will have to melt eventually, creating a potential for serious flooding when higher temperatures arrive in June, Weather Service Meteorologist Bruce Bauck said.

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(Note: if you want to keep an eye on high altitude snow depth, check out the “Flathead River Basin” section at the Montana SNOTEL data summary link on the Flood Information page.)

Larry Wilson: High country drives flooding

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Larry Wilson’s column this week discusses the spring thaw and the annual changes coming to the North Fork . . .

The snow is finally melting. In the last week, the piles of snow under my eaves have gone from being over three feet deep to just a narrow strip of ice, which will disappear today. Side roads and unplowed lanes that were snow-clogged 10 days ago are now dry.

More importantly, every day the snow line is higher up on both the Whitefish Divide and the Rocky Mountains, and the river has changed in the last three days from an unclear green to high and muddy. The gravel bar islands are beginning to disappear, and rain is predicted.

Will we have a flood? That is anybody’s guess…

Continue reading . . .

Cold weather expected, river levels to drop temporarily

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Well, cripes, now the Weather Service is saying that the weather system moving in is cold enough that river levels may actually drop a little for the next few days, even though we’ll be seeing some rain initially. The Flathead Beacon has the story . . .

Cold weather and rain hitting the Flathead in the next 24 hours and running through the weekend should slow down snowmelt in the mountains, leading to temporarily decreased river flows in the valley.

According to Chris Gibson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Missoula, the Flathead can expect some “big changes” coming in the weather, including winter weather advisories for parts of the state.

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Rain this week, with flooding likely to follow

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Rain and warmer temperature should bring river levels up across the area by the end of the week. Today’s Daily Inter Lake has a good write-up . . .

A mixed bag of weather is expected to push rivers across Western Montana, including the Flathead River, to flood stage this week.

The National Weather Service in Missoula is forecasting light rain, about a quarter inch, hitting Northwest Montana Monday night and today, followed by a dry Wednesday with temperatures in the 70s.

Then the region is expected to get about an inch of rain on Thursday. The chance of heavy rain on Thursday is listed at 100 percent by the Weather Service.

All Flathead Valley rivers are expected to see higher flows through the week.

Continue reading . . .