John Wheeler: Look at the river today and you're likely looking at the spring flood

FARGO — A Fargo resident came up to me this week and asked if I thought there would be much of a flood on the Red River this spring. I told him he is likely looking at the height of the spring flood right now. In fact, I told him, the only way there will be a river flood this spring is if it starts raining or snowing heavily.

There can be no snow melt flood because there is no snow to melt.True, the ground still has frost in it so any heavy rain or melting snow would not be absorbed with full efficiency, and there is always the possibility of extremely heavy precipitation coming too fast for the river basin to handle. However, the outlook for extremely heavy precipitation any time soon is not looking high.



In fact, the increasing potential of too little rain this spring is a much greater threat than any that of a spring flood.]]>.