(Radio Iowa) — The National Weather Service is set to release its first spring flood forecast later this week — and southwest Iowa officials are worried there will be more flooding this spring. Forecasters already say the amount of snow pack in the eastern Dakotas is a concern. Fremont County Emergency Management Coordinator Mike Crecelius expects more flooding in his area. “It all goes into the Missouri River up there and it, ultimately, comes down here,” he says.

Crecelius says the recovery from LAST spring’s historic flooding is still underway. “There’s still people in need f things. I’ve still got people coming in once in a while looking for stuff,” he says. “We’ve got a number of people displaced that are no longer in our county.”

Soil in the Missouri River Basin is saturated and cannot handle more rain or snow melt according to the National Weather Service — putting the region at higher risk of
flooding. Forecasters say tributaries to the Missouri River are likely to flood in western Iowa.

(Reporting by Iowa Public Radio’s Katie Peikes)