Potlatch Mill Getting Ready For Flooding St. Maries Dikes Reinforced, With Critical 10 Days Ahead

Potlatch Corp. is reinforcing dikes at its St. Maries lumber mill in preparation for flooding from northern Idaho’s snowmelt.

The lumber drying kilns at the old Edwards Mill are sure to flood this spring as the St. Joe River continues to rise and Lake Coeur d’Alene is full.

“It’s not a question of if it will flood, it’s a question of when,” Potlatch spokesman Michael Sullivan said. “Our basic problem is Coeur d’Alene Lake is full and there’s no place else for the water to go.”

The next 10 days will be critical, he said. Freezing temperatures at night have helped slow the river’s rise so far, but a warming trend could end that.

A warming trend has already started. The St. Joe River was almost 2 feet above flood stage Friday, at 2,134.3 feet. The river is expected to rise 2 more feet this weekend as the region experiences some of the warmest temperatures of the year.

“Everything’s kind of slow right now,” said Brian Avery, hydrologist for the National Weather Service. “Come this time next week, it’s going to be a different story.”

At the Potlatch lumber mill on the other side of town, prospects are more encouraging, Sullivan said. A new survey of the dikes shows they should be high enough to handle the river’s expected crest.

“We might have to do some sandbagging, but we don’t think it’s going to be any big deal,” he said.

Last year, the kilns at the Edwards Mill site flooded, causing some damage, Sullivan said. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is still making emergency improvements to the Meadowhurst Levee in St. Maries, which protects the airport, sewer plant and high school. State Highway 3, which is on the levee, has been reopened for one-way traffic. Northbound traffic is being diverted on a one-way detour.

Avery said Friday that warmer temperatures are starting to melt the snowpack at a higher elevation at a rate of about 1 inch a day.

, DataTimes