Mid-Mo combats flooding followed by snow

Jefferson City street crews clean McCarty Street from curb to curb Saturday.
Jefferson City street crews clean McCarty Street from curb to curb Saturday.

After getting heavy rain throughout the day Friday, Jefferson City got the second punch of a winter storm Saturday.

"From about 6 a.m. to 10 a.m., we had a window where nothing or hardly anything was coming down," Jefferson City Operations Division Director Britt Smith said Saturday. "So we took that opportunity to have our crews go out and pre-treat streets and roads then sent them back to get some rest to be ready for the snow."

Light rain began falling downtown around 11 a.m. Saturday, but approaching noon, it picked up in intensity. Just before 1 p.m., sleet and snow began to fall, which led to some accidents and vehicle slide-offs across the city. One crash on U.S. 50/63 near Clark Avenue sent two people to the hospital.

Jefferson City police reported they had worked nearly a dozen accidents during the winter weather event. Through 8 p.m. Saturday, Missouri Highway Patrol Troop F in Jefferson City reported their troopers had worked 50 crashes in their 13-county service area, and three involved injuries. They also helped 69 stranded motorists.

Some business closed early as the snow moved across the area Saturday afternoon, and the Missouri River Regional Library did not open because of the bad weather. Several churches across the area canceled services for today.

"We wanted to try and get curb to curb on all our streets so we could get the slush off," Smith said. "With temperatures falling into the teens, that slush goes to ice very quick. It was fairly easy to push this snow off, and we didn't have to use too much chemical materials. We did have some equipment break downs that caused a few delays, but we got those fixed and that really didn't hamper our work.

"When you count our 24 plows and then you add the parking division and airport crews who were all out working this storm, we had nearly 50 people out there," Smith added

The snow began moving out of Jefferson City around 5:30 p.m. Saturday, and the National Weather Service in St. Louis was estimating most locations in Mid-Missouri got 2-3 inches.

Between Thursday and Friday, the NWS estimated Jefferson City and the Lake of the Ozarks got 3 inches of rain with 2 inches in most locations to the west. The higher amounts were reported to the east with Linn picking up 5.5 inches of rain and Meta got 4.6 inches.

The heavy rains prompted Ameren Missouri to open the flood gates at Bagnell Dam at 11 p.m. Friday night, and releases continued into Saturday. With as much as 50,000 cubic feet of water per second being released, the Osage River rose by 4 feet.

The NWS continued a flash flood warning for the Osage River at the Mari-Osa Delta until 6:45 p.m. Monday. The river was at 22.5 feet Saturday, more than 3 feet above the flood stage of 19 feet. The river was predicted to crest at 23.5 feet early today and then start to fall and go below flood stage this afternoon.

A flood warning for the Moreau River near Jefferson City was also continued until 6:06 p.m. Monday. The river had reached nearly 22 feet Saturday, 5 feet above flood stage of 17 feet, and it was expected to crest at nearly 24.5 feet before starting to fall and go below flood stage this afternoon.

"This was a hard storm for our guys because they had to be out in those heavy rains Friday, cleaning out culverts and pipes that had leaves and other debris in them," Cole County Public Works Director Larry Benz said. "We were also worried that we would get some straight-line winds or possibly a tornado, but thankfully, that didn't happen."

Benz said after they went back to treat the paved roads, the drivers for their 26 trucks took a break and then went back out on the road when the snow hit Saturday afternoon, but they were hampered by flooding in some locations along the Moreau River.

"There were plenty of places where we had to take detours just like everybody else, so we couldn't clean some locations in the manner we usually would," Benz said. "We had to put up the detour signs at places such as Meadows Ford Road and Buffalo Road."

Benz said they did plan to have crews come back in this morning to go over roads.

"We went through some areas with graders to take care of some of the eroded areas after the heavy rains, but we'll have to go back to those same areas once it dries up some next week to make sure it's done right."