CAPE BRACES FOR RECORD FLOOD CREST ON FRIDAY AT 47.2 FEET

From her vantage point atop Cape Rock, Becky Daume surveyed the coffee-colored, churning floodwaters of the Mississippi River.

"It's beautiful to look out at, but it's highly destructive," she said, looking out over a swollen bend in the river.

The river is expected to crest at Cape Girardeau Friday at a record 47.2 feet, more than 15 feet above flood stage.

Daume and her family, who live on County Road 635 north of Cape Girardeau, spent Tuesday serving as "tour guides" for visiting relatives from New Jersey, who wanted to see the flooding first hand.

"This just happens to be an added attraction," said Jean Ann Brown, Daume's sister-in-law, who brought her camera along to get a picture of the flooding.

Brown grew up in the Cape Girardeau area. She now lives in Belle Mead, N.J., with her husband, Tom.

The flooding has been big news in New Jersey. "It was pretty well front page news," said Jean Ann Brown.

"Everybody is talking about it," her husband said. "I think it is just a big national disaster."

Jean Ann Brown's mother, Anna Marie Daume, who lives just north of Cape Girardeau and was along for the ride, viewed the floodwaters passing by.

"This is worse than anything I've ever seen," she said.

The Daumes and Browns were among a number of people who visited the site Tuesday to view the flood-swollen river.

The river stood at 46.9 feet on the Cape Girardeau gauge Tuesday, up a tenth of a foot from the previous day, the National Weather Service said.

The river was expected to drop to 46.8 feet today before rising to 47 feet on Thursday and cresting at 47.2 feet on Friday.

Earlier, the river had been forecast to crest this week at 49 feet. The lower crest forecast was welcome news to those fighting the floodwaters in Cape Girardeau.

"Any time they can lower the projection, then so much the better," said Mark Hasheider, Cape Girardeau emergency operations coordinator.

The lower-than-originally-projected crest forecast has basically brought a halt to sandbagging for now, he said.

If the recent dry weather holds up north, Hasheider said, the level of the Mississippi River at Cape Girardeau could drop by as much as a half a foot to a foot a day. "We definitely would like to see it leave as rapidly as possible," he said.

In beleaguered Ste. Genevieve, Tuesday was a day of rest for many weary flood-fighters.

"We sort of gave everybody the day off from sandbagging," said Jean Rissover, a volunteer who has been handling public information duties at city hall.

"Everybody is pretty tired, but we managed to achieve a pretty good stockpile of sandbags."

National Guard troops and the regular flood-fighting team, however, remained busy Tuesday backfilling and reinforcing the levees protecting the historic town.

Sunday's break in an interior levee on the south side of the city was not causing any further flooding problems and the main levees were still holding late Tuesday afternoon, Rissover said.

Flooding in recent weeks has forced the evacuation of between 400 and 450 homes and businesses in the Ste. Genevieve area, she said.

The river at Ste. Genevieve is forecast to crest Thursday at 49 feet, 22 feet above flood stage.

"We are kind of in a watch-and-wait mode right now," Rissover said.