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Live Public Safety Communications from Bay City, Michigan and Surrounding Areas

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(03/15/19) - While some Mid-Michigan communities deal with the aftermath of tornadoes, others are concerned about flooding. In Clare County and Midland County rivers are rising and they aren't expected to crest until sometime over the weekend. Midland County Emergency Management Coordinator Jenifier Boyer said now is the time to make preparations. "Just be aware of your surroundings and how close you are in proximity to the river," Boyer said. "Also the flood maps are online here in Midland, both online on the county website and city website so you can see kind of how close your property and stuff is to the river." Right now the focus is on communicating with people who live in the county and preparing for what comes next. "We're all just kind of on standby, monitoring the situation, all different agencies are kind of doing their thing. Fire will be out this afternoon within the city doing notifications door to door for the areas they're anticipating to be affected. We're putting information out for people, we sent a press release out earlier," Boyer said. Boyer expects more road closures overnight Friday into Saturday. You can find a link with more information about the areas they are watching by clicking on the 'Related Link' with this story. In Clare County, two major roads were closed as of late Friday afternoon, in addition to some smaller city streets. The main roads include Harrison Avenue between Gladwin Road and Monroe Road, and is Partridge Road between Pine Road and Forest Road. Jerry Becker, the director of the Clare County Emergency Management and Homeland Security Division, said they are concerned about people driving at night. "At night you can't see the washouts, you can't see what roads have been undermined or compromised, and that's where it's a danger," Becker said. "We don't want anybody to drive into a road that's not there anymore because a culvert washed out or something." He said Harrison Avenue is the perfect example. One lane looks normal, but the other side is washed out underneath. If it was still covered by water a driver wouldn't be able to see it until it's too late. The water has receded at that location and others, but rivers in the area aren't expected to crest until the weekend. "We've had rainfall on top of snowmelt over the last 24 to 36 hours. We've had a lot of runoff, lot of ponding of water, lot of water over roadways, dealing with that. Of course now this afternoon it's changing over to snow, so I'm sure we'll have some freeze up going on," Becker said.

Read more https://www.abc12.com/content/news/-Clare-Midland-counties-prepare-for-flooding-507219991.html