Freedom–December 15, 2014–It has been less than four weeks since my last report. During that time we had snow, ice, a power outage and now some warmer weather. The big storm hit Wednesday before Thanksgiving. We lost power for a couple of hours, but downtown Freedom was out until late Thursday, early Friday morning.

Steady rain early last week, totaling over an inch, and some warm weather reduced the snow level and removed some of the ice, but at least 2″ of packed snow remains in all areas. Most of Broad Bay is ice-covered but not ready to be walked on.

The water level in mid-November was 404.26′.  It got up to 404.68′ by the first of December. After the rain started on the 10th, it took about a day before the lake level began a steady increase before cresting at 406.39′ early this morning. That is only a foot below the summer level of 407.25′. If we receive the amount of rain predicted for Wednesday, the level may be up another 6 to 12 inches by Christmas day.

The dam is wide open. Flow rate continues to increase each day.

Bob Smart