Flood watch issued for Douglas County as storms threaten heavy rain

Flood concerns centered on the low-lying parts of Lawrence and Douglas County, especially South Lawrence near the Broken Arrow watershed and North Lawrence near the Kansas River, as the National Weather Service kept a flood watch in effect until 1 p.m. Sunday. The most vulnerable stretches included the south-edge corridor between Louisiana Street and Haskell Indian Nations University, from 23rd Street to the flood-protection levee along the north side of the Wakarusa River, plus N. 2nd Street in North Lawrence.

Forecasters said thunderstorms moving in from western Kansas and southeastern Nebraska could produce multiple rounds of rainfall over the same areas, with 1 to 3 inches expected for most places and localized totals of 3 to 6 inches possible. Briefing materials from the Kansas City/Pleasant Hill office put expected rainfall accumulations at 2 to 4 inches, with locally higher amounts possible, and warned that saturated soils could trigger rapid runoff, flash flooding and mainstem river flooding by Sunday morning.

For Douglas County commuters, the watch mattered across the county’s main travel corridors, including Interstate 70, U.S. 24, U.S. 40, U.S. 59 and K-10. The risk cut deepest in Lawrence’s core, the area south of the Kansas River and north of 23rd Street between Iowa Street and Haskell Avenue, where more than one-third of Douglas County’s households and more than half of its workforce are concentrated.

Douglas County Emergency Management, whose job is to mitigate, prepare for, respond to and recover from major emergencies and disasters, was tracking the same threat as the region carried fresh memories of flooding earlier this month. Governor Laura Kelly issued a verbal state of disaster emergency proclamation at 7:31 p.m. on June 4 after heavy rains and two rounds of intense thunderstorms on June 3-4 produced the worst flooding in northeast Kansas, with multiple river systems flooding or expected to reach moderate flood stage. That recent pattern made the weekend watch a warning for anyone in flood-prone parts of the county to stay alert for later forecasts and possible Flood Warnings.