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Snowmelt leads to rising rivers

Flooding along the Rush River led to a road closure on Highway 93 in Henderson Township.

HENDERSON TOWNSHIP, Minn. -- With the snow melting, water levels are rising on many Minnesota rivers.

Flooding along the Rush River led to a road closure Sunday morning in Sibley County.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation reported that Highway 93 was closed between Highway 169 and Henderson.

"It's not good what's coming. It's a big inconvenience to be quite honest with you," said Jamie McNay, who lives right off Highway 93.

According to Sven Mattson, Henderson Township supervisor, it's not unusual for this stretch of road to flood.

"Every several years we have a problem here and there's really nothing we can do with it because the Rush River gets out of its banks and it flows where it wants to go," Mattson said.

By Sunday afternoon, the water was receding on the road. However, Mattson said it could spill over again later in the week.

"When this road floods completely it's 25 miles from Henderson to Le Sueur where it's usually 5 miles," he said.

Meteorologist Eric Ahasic with the National Weather Service Twin Cities said our spring has been a bit delayed this year.

"We had a record-breaking cold start to April and we saw a record-breaking amount of snow in April. So usually our flooding's March... by April we're done," Ahasic said.

According to Ahasic, southwestern Minnesota rivers are flooding first.

"So right now we're kind of in the smaller river phase. Some of those creeks, tributaries, smaller rivers like the Redwood River, the Cottonwood River are flooding now. Eventually that's all going to flow into the Minnesota River and we're going to start to see some rises there in communities along the Minnesota River and then later on, maybe towards early May, we'll start to see it along the Mississippi," Ahasic said.

He went on to say, "At least for now, our 7-day forecast looks dry which is really going to help mitigate any real major flooding."

According to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resource's website, a majority of river levels across the state are listed as "high" or "very high." You can check out the river levels, here.

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