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Red River Valley flood risk keeps receding [UPDATED]
Published 10:12am Friday, January 27, 2012 Updated 12:13pm Friday, January 27, 2012MINNEAPOLIS — The risk of significant flooding in the Red River Valley is down from recent years and even lower than last month’s forecast due to the lack of snow, forecasters said Thursday — bolstering hopes the region may be spared a fourth consecutive battle this spring.
The flood risks are also low across the rest of North Dakota and Minnesota, the National Weather Service said.
No more than a few inches of snow cover the ground across the Red River basin in eastern North Dakota and northwestern Minnesota, said Weather Service meteorologist Jim Kaiser in Grand Forks, N.D. More importantly, he said, the snow contains less than a half-inch of water and much of that moisture should soak into the dry topsoil as it melts.
“Since we’ve had below-normal precipitation from before freeze-up through this winter, our risk of significant flooding is quite a bit less than it’s been for the last three or four years,” Kaiser said.
The updated flood outlook released Thursday said that while the risk on the Red River and its Minnesota and North Dakota tributaries has receded from December’s forecast, and there’s little chance of major flooding, the chance of minor flooding is greater than 50 percent at Fargo-Moorhead on the Red River and at Dilworth on the Buffalo River in Minnesota. There’s also a fair chance — over 33 percent — of minor flooding on the Red at Grand Forks.
But Kaiser said that the impact on the public from what forecasters consider minor flooding is minimal. At this point, nothing suggests there’ll be a need for sandbagging, he said.
The town of Olso faces a fair chance of moderate flooding on the Minnesota side of the Red River. Other communities facing a fair chance of minor flooding include Sabin and Hawley.
