FORT KENT, Maine – Reports of flooding are already popping up in the St. John Valley, with Fort Kent Police reporting flooding and washouts on Route 161 near the Drive In Road in addition to unofficial reports of flooding in St. Agatha and Wallagrass via the Aroostook County Flood Watch Facebook page, which is managed by the Aroostook County Emergency Management Agency.
Fort Kent Police posted about the flooding at 10:40 p.m. on Wednesday night, and advised motorists to use extreme caution while in the area, to slow down, and to watch out for expanding mud and water in the roadway.
“Maine DOT has been alerted to the danger and will be responding as soon as they are able,” the post concluded, “but that will likely not be until Thursday morning due to the nature of the hazard and the equipment required to clear the issue.”
The road was reopened around 10 a.m. Thursday.
Derrick Ouellette, Deputy Director of Aroostook County EMA, said that aside from the reports posted on the flood watch page, he has not yet received any flooding reports from Aroostook town officials.
He said that, according to the National Weather Service’s advanced hydrological prediction service, no rivers or lakes in the region are in a state where there would be a cause for imminent flooding danger.
Ouellette said the more immediate danger now would be going out on the ice. He said ice is degrading in many spots, and appears to be melting from the top and bottom. Ouellette said a majority of rivers appear to be moving, but that no large ice movement has occurred as of Thursday morning.
“It’s not very thick, and it’s not very sturdy looking,” he said of the ice. “If anyone’s out on the ice, that would be more worrisome to me than flooding at this point.”
Based on the current information, Ouellette said there is no immediate danger of major flooding. But if this changes, he said they will make sure the public is notified.
He said these weather patterns are occurring much earlier than normal.
“I couldn’t give an exact timeframe,” he said, “but I think we’re probably about a month ahead of time if I were to take a guess.”
