TRAVERSE CITY,
Mich. (AP) - Water levels are surging in the Great Lakes and likely will set
records this summer, forecasters said Monday - a remarkable turnaround from
earlier this decade that’s bringing welcome relief to shippers and marina
owners, but causing flooding and heavy erosion in some areas.
A six-month
bulletin from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers predicted Lake Superior and
Lake Erie soon will reach unprecedented high points, as a heavy winter
snowpack across the region’s northern section melts and mingles with water
gushing into the lakes from rivers swollen with spring rainfall.
Levels have been
trending upward at varying rates since 2013, when Lakes Huron and Michigan
fell to their lowest points and the other Great Lakes were significantly
below normal. That was the nadir of a nearly 15-year slump that stranded
pleasure boats, forced cargo vessels to lighten loads, dried up wetlands and
fueled conspiracy theories that water was somehow being siphoned off to the
parched West.
“It’s quite the
shift,” said Keith Kompoltowicz, chief of watershed hydrology with the
Corps’ district office in Detroit. “Now we’re at the other extreme.”
Lake Superior,
which holds more water than the other four combined and sends them a
continuous flow through its southern outlet, is about 15 inches above its
long-term average level for this time of year, and nine inches higher than a
year ago. Lake Erie is 26 inches over its long-term average.
Michigan, Huron and
Ontario aren’t expected to set records but are well above average,
Kompoltowicz said.
Great Lakes levels
are known to fluctuate over time. But experts said the prolonged drop-off of
the past decade and the more recent rise likely result at least in part from
a warming climate.
“These events are
quite consistent with what scientists have been expecting with long-term
climate change patterns,” said Drew Gronewold of the University of
Michigan’s School for Environment and Sustainability. “The challenge is that
it’s very hard to forecast when those extremes are going to occur and when
the transition between them might occur.”
Kolleen Jones,
co-owner of the Betsie Bay Marina in Elberta, Michigan, said the recovery
was a blessing. The previous owners were hammered when levels dropped so low
that many of the 95 boat slips were unusable.
“We were
considering not even buying it,” Jones said. “Now, we’re working our tails
off to raise our docks to get them out of the water.”
The low water was
costly for ships that haul iron ore, coal and other bulk commodities between
Great Lakes ports. Things are much better now, although with water so high,
vessels must slow down on rivers and channels to avoid creating wakes that
damage shoreline docks, said Glen Nekvasil of the Cleveland-based Lake
Carriers’ Association.
“These vessels have
very high operating costs and anything that lengthens a voyage adds to those
costs,” Nekvasil said.
Another sign that
the pendulum may have swung too far for comfort: flooding and erosion, which
the Corps expects to worsen. The agency dispatched a technical team Monday
to help with proper placement of sandbags in Sodus, New York, where Lake
Ontario overflows loom. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer declared an emergency last
week because of flooding in southeastern Michigan.
Storms that have
battered the central U.S. this spring have filled Great Lakes tributary
waters while kicking up big waves that are eroding shorelines, said Guy
Meadows, director of the Great Lakes Research Center at Michigan
Technological University.
“We expect lake
levels to fall again but this episode of high water is going to take a
couple of years to work its way through the system,” Meadows said. “It’s
going to be a big hit.”