River Levels

[Norton]

With the latest flooding, I thought folks might be interested in how this compares with other high water levels.  There are gauges at Johnson, Jeffersonville, and Georgia.  The Georgia gauge is just upstream of Arrowhead Lake.  You can see the readings here:

http://water.weather.gov/ahps2/hydrograph.php?wfo=btv&gage=geov1&view=1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1&toggles=10,7,8,2,9,15,6&type=0

From that page, you can go to the other gauges, and look at historical highs.

Others have commented that yesterday the Lamoille in Fairfax was higher than most could remember.  I know for sure that it's the highest in more than 25 years (at least).

Yesterday, the Georgia reading was 3.1 ft above flood stage, Jeffersonville was 4.2 ft above, and Johnson was 7 ft above.

Many Johnson residents remember August of 95, when they were 10 ft above flood stage, or about 3 ft higher than yesterday.  In Fairfax, the water only rose to 1.8 ft above flood stage, less than yesterday.

Of course most people know that the big flood came in November of 1927.  The level in Johnson was 17 ft above flood stage, 10 feet deeper than yesterday.  In Fairfax, it was 10 ft above flood stage, almost 7 ft deeper than yesterday.

[Razzle Dazzle]

Great facts...thanks.

[Norton]

I forgot to mention two things about those numbers........

One, I referred to the level in "Fairfax", but that gauge isn't in the village, so it doesn't necessarily correlate directly to the exact level in the village.  It does give some indication of the relative severity of the events.

Secondly, those who look at the river gauge numbers might want to know that these gauges look at the height of the water and don't know the difference between liquid water and ice.  In the location where the Georgia gauge is, it is common for the ice to build up, and if you look at historical highs you might be mislead into thinking that we've had lots of high water events in Jan-April, but in many of those cases the gauge is just seeing chucks of ice that are sitting higher than the water level.