Rains swell state's lakes

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- Missouri reservoir lakes are brimming with flood waters from heavy June rains, a change from drought levels last summer but also a potential hazard for boaters due to debris.

Tammy Gilmore, natural resource manager at Truman Lake, is warning people against water skiing or zipping around on personal watercraft.

At 24 feet above normal, the lake is a minefield of submerged trees and bobbing obstacles.

Torrential rains last month soaked eastern Kansas and bordering areas of Missouri, pouring more than 15 inches in five days on some communities.

Now, some of those floodwaters are flowing into Missouri's flood-control reservoirs.

That makes this summer a far cry from last, when severe drought sapped many lakes and left some boat ramps high and dry.

At Lake of the Ozarks, 11 of 12 floodgates at Bagnell Dam are open, dumping 50,000 cubic feet of water a second into the Osage River.

This time last year, only 500 cubic feet of water a second were being released, just enough to keep the fish in the river below and federal stream-flow monitors happy.