RIVERFEST ORGANIZERS WATCH RISING MISSISSIPPI

As Riverfest nears and the floodgates keep opening and closing with the ups and downs of the Mississippi River, Laurel Adkisson tries to be philosophical.

After all, she says, you can't expect the river not to be a factor in an event called Riverfest, and this year's theme is "Mississippi Magic."

"Last year, for the first time that I was involved with the festival, the floodgates were actually closed," said Adkisson, chairwoman of the annual event scheduled June 14 and 15. "It was disappointing because you couldn't walk out to see the river, which is the whole focus of the festival. But we got past that and we had a good time."

This year, she said, "if the floodgates are closed, we'll deal with it. All of our plans are scheduled for downtown" and not on the water.

Organizers are a little worried about whether the American Queen will be able to dock at Cape Girardeau for the start of the festival. The riverboat's arrival is a highlight festivalgoers would miss, she said, "plus not having that 500 or 600 people get off the boat and come through the festival."

Adkisson isn't the only one keeping a watchful eye on the river.

The National Weather Service is predicting a crest of about 40 feet at Cape Girardeau for June 5, and about 36 feet at New Madrid for June 6, said Mary Lamm, a hydrologist at the weather service's Paducah, Ky., office.

Flood stage at Cape Girardeau is 32 feet on the Cape Girardeau gauge. The Mississippi River was at 35.2 feet Thursday. It reached a high of 40.6 feet May 17.

"All the rain that fell late last week and this week, it's just slowly making its way down," Lamm said. "A small part of it will be water off the Ohio."

It's not unusual to see river levels fluctuate at this time of year, she said, as heavy spring rains and dry spells alternate.

The Themis Street floodgate was closed Wednesday, said Andy Juden, president of the Main Street Levee District's Board of Commissioners. The floodgate at Broadway will probably be closed today or Saturday, he said.

"The water will come in the gate at 35 1/2 feet at Themis and at 38 1/2 feet at Broadway, and of course we want to get them closed well before that," he said.

The Main Street Levee District maintains a third floodgate under the Mississippi River bridge. "We've only closed that once, except for maintenance, and that was for cause during the flood of '93," Juden said.

"I hope after this spell the river will go down and stay down," he said. "You never know. We've had floods every month. Both the rivers, the Ohio and the Mississippi, are flooding, so it's going to take some normal weather."

Flooding north on the Mississippi is holding up river traffic.

Leo Steger of Mississippi Barge Lines said: "We've got two boats stopped, one at Lock 24 at Clarksville and one at Lock 22 at Saverton, due to high water. So far the rest of our river operations are fine."

Steger said he is following forecasts and river crest predictions closely.

"Hopefully the rain will quit up north and let some of the water run out," he said.

Emergency preparedness coordinators for both Cape Girardeau city and county said high water isn't causing too many problems.

"As long as it stays in the 40-foot range, there's not a whole lot of problems there," said Mark Hasheider, a Cape Girardeau firefighter and the city's emergency preparedness coordinator.

When the river started rising, he said, crews prepared for crests of 41 or 42 feet and higher. Those crests never materialized, he said, and crest projections for points north along the Mississippi have been lowered as well.

"We're basically prepared and set and ready to go," he said.

Some county roads may flood as the river tops 37 or 38 feet at Cape Girardeau, said Dave Hitt, the county's emergency preparedness coordinator. "But those are the roads that always get water on them."