The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Lower Mississippi River Forecast Center (LMRFC) released the update below today to document the low river stage conditions. The LMRFC provided the quoted text below along with the attachment to update historic low water readings and the updated river stage predictions from Cairo (IL) to Baton Rouge (LA).

“The rain and runoff response from Hurricane Helene is now peaking on th e Lower Mississippi near Natchez, MS and will be peaking at New Orleans in the next couple days. Behind this rise we are not seeing any rainfall over the next 16 days and we anticipate that the Lower Ohio and Mississippi Rivers will continue to recede back to low flow conditions.

The Ohio at Cairo is expected to fall below 10 ft by October 14th and continue a gradual recession to base flow levels beyond that for the next several weeks following. These recessions will soon be making their way down the Mississippi for the upcoming future as we enter our climatologically drier months of October and November..” (Emphasis supplied)

The supporting information below was prepared by the Big River Coalition:

The Carrolton Gage (New Orleans) reading at 1100 hours today was 4.46 feet with a 24-hour change of + 0.16 feet.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service Extended Streamflow Prediction (28-Day) for the Carrollton Gage issued today forecasts stages will rise to 5.2 feet on October 11 and to then begin a slow fall to 3.0 feet on November 6 (2024).

Long-range forecasts only include precipitation expected to fall in the next 48-hours.