The National Weather Service predicts the river will reach a crest of 23.5 feet in Cedar Rapids on Tuesday morning.
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The Cedar Rapids school district has cancelled classes for three days and closed its offices because of the flooding expected in Iowa’s second largest city. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream.
Other cities and towns in Iowa are also facing serious flooding, including Waterloo and Charles City, CNN affiliate KCRG-TV reported.
The Bertram people got the idea from posts on a Facebook page called 2016 Flood for Cedar Rapids.
The National Weather Service has revised its forecast for the Cedar River near Iowa’s second-largest city of Cedar Rapids.
Cedar Rapids’ mayor says the city and its residents have been working hard to prepare for flooding along the Cedar River, and says the city has “one more day” to finish that work. “We are delighted to be able to do that”, said Father Chris Podhajsky, pastor of Immaculate Conception and St. Wenceslaus, to KGAN.
Flooding already claimed two lives last week in western Wisconsin’s Vernon County.
But farmers hit by mudslides in the valleys “are basically in hell right now”, said Vance Haugen, the agriculture agent for the UW Extension in Crawford County.
“Those flooded areas probably will get harvested, but farmers will have to harvest them separately, and have them accepted at elevator at a lower price or at a salvage rate”.
“Well, we continued the FEMA buyout program where instead of having 35 houses that were damaged we could have had another 20 or 25 that were taken out, so that relieves some tension and we’ve upgraded our lift station as much as we can. And if you go into the fields too soon with your machinery you can squash the soil structure and it can take years – sometimes decades – to fix some of that damaged soil”. In addition, a mandatory evacuation was in effect for parts of Palo, and a curfew in the evacuation area had been declared from 8 p.m. Sunday to 6 a.m. Monday. That will lead to machinery breakdowns during harvest, he said.
City officials touted the “tremendous progress” made in flood preparations, which was to be completed Sunday evening.
“The crops were so attractive and a lot of guys went from believing that this was going to be one of the best harvests ever to wondering if they’ll even get into their fields for the harvest”, Hady said. “That’s tough to take”, Haugen said.
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Heavy rain this week in eastern Iowa and southern Wisconsin is behind the flood threat in those areas.
