Missouri River forecast to rise

Officials with the National Weather Service in St. Louis said Monday that the Missouri River is forecast to rise in response to the 5-6 inches of rain that fell in the Missouri Basin this past week. Thanks to a mostly rain-free forecast this week, the Missouri is expected to crest this week and start to fall.

Points along the Missouri basin will rise 2-5 feet above where they were at the end of last week.

As of Monday afternoon, the Missouri was at 27.5 feet. The forecast called for the river to reach 30 feet by sometime Wednesday and start to fall Thursday afternoon. The Monday forecast also showed the river could drop down past flood stage of 23 feet sometime late Sunday or early Monday.

Officials at Ameren Missouri reported Monday afternoon that discharges from Bagnell Dam were at just more than 47,000 cubic feet per second. That was nearly the same amount being discharged from Truman Dam at Warsaw. Ameren officials said they continued to work with Truman so that they tried to match flows in an effort to keep levels steady on the Osage River.

After re-opening it last week when flood waters receded, MoDOT announced on Monday afternoon that Missouri 179 at Sandy Hook was again closed due to flooding. Missouri 94 in Callaway County also remained closed as did many of the roads in and around North Jefferson City.

Due to the recent heavy rains and train traffic being rerouted through Mid-Missouri, Amtrak's Missouri River Runner train service has once again been suspended indefinitely. Buses will take passengers with Amtrak tickets to their destinations.

Additional weather resources:

Eastern Missouri river stages

Western Missouri river stages

Mid-Missouri forecast, radar

Ameren's Truman and Bagnall Dam daily report

Missouri state highway road closings