This situation should be over soon

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William Fraser

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Mar 24, 2007, 2:24:19 PM3/24/07

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We expect the flooding situation to resolve itself one way or the other within a day or two, possibly even today.

The warming temperatures continue to melt and weaken the ice in the river. With the exception of a small jam of broken ice near Gallison Hill Road, all the upstream ice is beginning to break up and move down the river. It is located now between the Granite St Bridge and the Main Street Bridge. It is moving slowly since the river level is low. I observed an open channel of water opening up ahead of this ice, stretching out beyond the Hunger Mtn Co-op.

Further downstream, all the ice from the Dog River has completely moved out leaving wide open river. Channels are freely flowing from about DET to the Interstate bridge. There remains some significant ice from the Bailey Ave bridge to about DET. The warm weather and water is weakening it however and we have observed frazil ice floating out from underneath this ice so, presumably, some of the freeze up jam is starting to break down.

We expect the most movement today to occur between 3 and 5 Pm when the air and water are the warmest. We see no sign of rapid river rise which would lead to a fast break up and greater chance of jamming. Some rain and maybe snow are expected tonight but not enough to create a problem.

Everything is going as well as we could hope right now. However until the ice has substantially moved through past the interstate bridge we will have some concerns. Looking at the weather forecast, it seems very likely that the ice could be out by tomorrow or Monday and maybe even tonight. On the other hand, if its going to jam it will most likely be today or tomorrow.

I know this has been a long process for everyone. Please hang in there and keep watching and listening. Something is going to happen to end this within a day or two. Right now things look good and like they are going our way. But as long as there is substantial ice in the river we need to keep our guard up.

City, Vermont Emergency Management, Corps of Engineers and other officials are remaining in close contact all weekend long and are performing regular river checks and updates,