Flood in Washington County, Nebraska

Flooding along the Missouri River gradually worsened during June as record releases from Gavins Point Dam brought widespread flooding along the river. The river near Blair climbed to around its 26.5 foot flood stage late in May, and then steadily rose into mid to late June climbing to a little over 32 feet during the last week or so of the month. The flooding in Washington county was especially felt in the Fort Calhoun area where at least 60 homes or cabins were flooded or cutoff by flood waters. At least 200 residences in the county were evacuated leaving at least 500 people displaced. This prompted the city to open the high school up for flood victims. Blair spent $500,000 to build up a levee surrounding its water treatment plant which held through June. The Ft. Calhoun Nuclear power plant was in refueling shut-down when the flooding started in April and because of the high waters it remained shut down through the summer as flood waters surrounded the plant prompting emergency sand-bagging. In addition, recreation areas and roads along the river were flooded. A 58 year-old male drowned when working on a levee near Ft. Calhoun when his truck overturned into flood waters. The flooding persisted into July.

A record rain event in May in eastern Montana combined with high water from storms in April and May (and early spring snow melt) and brought high water to the Missouri River chain of reservoirs. The high water levels plus the threat of flood waters due an unusually high snow pack in the Rockies over the upper Missouri River Basin and additional heavy rain all contributed to record releases from the Missouri River Reservoirs. Releases from Gavins Point Dam, which is the last in the chain, increased to over 100 kcfs during the first week of June and then rose to around 160 kcfs by the middle of the month. The previous record release was 70 kcfs. The high releases produced flooding along the Missouri River which gradually worsened from May into June and then continued into July.