After a few days of intense rain in a short amount of time, a flood warning was issued for Gratiot County Monday, May 18. Areas in St. Louis and Alma are being affected by the massive flooding from the Pine River. In fact, the river was almost completely covering St. Louis’ Wheeler Field Wednesday night. The warning was active until Thursday, May 21, and the flood stage was 8.0 feet as of Tuesday afternoon.

Thomas Zacharko stated, “I think that it is bad, and hopefully it does not ruin any of our fields…hopefully it doesn’t get any worse.”

The flooding is already subsiding as skies are clearing up and the water is getting a chance to drain. The weather is projected to be sunnier in the next couple of days, so the flooding is expected to decrease substantially.

Peyton Allen shared, “My first reaction was that I didn’t think it rained that much, so I was surprised when I saw that there was so much flooding.”

In the fall of 2019, the Pine River flooded and suspended school activities involving Wheeler Field, but the waters didn’t reach the bleachers like they did this time. There has been major flooding in St. Louis numerous times before this, however.

Midland County has much worse flooding as multiple dams have failed. Around 10,000 mid-Michigan residents have been ordered to evacuate their homes, and Governor Whitmer declared a state of emergency in the county Tuesday. Midland received around 4.70 inches of rain over the course of two days.