River rises again, along with worries in Illinois

Recent levee breaks north of Canton, not far from the Iowa line, had allowed the river level to drop there and at other towns far north of St. Louis.

Officials knew the water would rise again to crests expected during the weekend, and while the amount of the increase caught them off guard, it didn't make things any worse. The folks in Canton were keeping a tight watch over the city's levee, but it continued to hold strong against the Mississippi.

The river reached 26.3 feet Saturday morning at Canton after dipping below 23 feet two days earlier, and it was expected to crest later in the day at 26.4 feet.

That's still more than a foot lower than the record set during the Great Flood of '93, and 3 feet below the top of the city's levee.

The new Saturday morning reading was "a full foot higher than we expected it to be," said Canton emergency management spokeswoman Monica Heaton. "The levee's fine, but the river did another unexpected thing last night."

Forecasters said Saturday afternoon that the river would crest several inches higher than expected in Hannibal and at Quincy, Ill., where it was set to crest late in the day more than 2 feet below the '93 flood peak.

"We're confident we can hold that and not have any issues," said Adams County's emergency management chief, John Simon. "It'll be another sigh of relief, but it's not over yet. We're not out of the water yet, no pun intended. We have a while to go."

Hannibal emergency management director John Hark said the river was well above flood stage but still about 3 feet below the record set in 1993. Before a levee break north of Hannibal in Meyer, Ill., allowed some water to drain out of the river last week, Hannibal was expecting a crest at or near the record.

The crest was revised Saturday to 29.1 feet, set to arrive in Mark Twain's hometown sometime Sunday morning.

Barge operators say they're losing tens of thousands of dollars in revenue a day because flooding has brought freight traffic to a standstill on a stretch of the upper Mississippi River.

In a battle to contain the water, the Army Corps of Engineers closed 13 locks on June 12.

Nine locks remained closed Saturday on a 345-kilometre stretch of the river between Illinois City, Ill., and Winfield, Mo., northwest of St. Louis.

More than 100 barges loaded with grain, cement, scrap metal, fertilizer and other products are stranded. The shutdown is expected to last a few weeks and involves primarily non-perishable goods.

The crest of the river was still moving downstream on the weekend and dozens of towns near the waterway were under a flood watch.

The rush of water broke or spilled over more than two dozen levees from Iowa to Missouri earlier in the week, submerging small towns and large tracts of prime farmland.