Rivers creep to highest levels

Soggy weather and melting snow has

brought the Whitefish River close to flood stage. The river is

currently at 8.3 feet, the highest it has been this season. Flood

stage is at 8.5 feet.

Both the Whitefish and Stillwater

rivers have flood warnings in place for the next few days. Warnings

mean no major flooding is expected, but the two rivers likely will

spill out of their banks at some point this week.

A predicted stretch of cool weather

should keep the rivers in check, though, Bruce Bauck of the

National Weather Service said.

Snow levels on Wednesday and Thursday

will dip to 5,000 feet in elevation with high temperatures at Logan

Pass predicted to be near freezing. The extended forecast shows a

70 percent chance the cool pattern will persist.

“We’ve gotten by with modest to

significant flooding,” Bauck said, “but we haven’t seen a huge

flood yet. But the snowpack remains huge at higher elevations.

There is a lot of potential for very high flows in the future.”

It will take an extended period of warm

days in the high 80s and 90s to bring snow off the mountain, Bauck

said.

The Weather Service isn’t predicting

that will happen in the next 10 days.