Commercial barge traffic through the Nickajack Gorge section of the Tennessee River has been on lockdown since Saturday, after heavy rains returned to the region, according to the Tennessee Valley Authority.
Meanwhile, a number of trails in the Tennessee Riverpark have been closed due to flooding.
Shipping is typically impacted once the Chickamauga Dam begins releasing about 748,000 gallons of water per second, according to James Everett, who manages TVA’s river forecast center.
“The Nickajack Gorge section goes all the way several miles downstream of Chattanooga, where we get very high velocities and high currents. The area is kind of twisty and narrow,” he said.
He added that barge traffic had been impacted through most of the month of February as well.
“We had been above that [spill rate] from the first week of February to about Feb. 24,” he said. “Then it finally dropped below [748,000 gallons per second], to allow barge traffic to go up or down the river. And that continued through this past Saturday. It gave us a five-day window where the gorge was back open.”
Everett said that forecasts call for rain through Thursday, with totals of between 2 and 4 inches over the next four days.
“We’ve already seen about an inch or so of rain, and we’re expecting activity daily,” he said.
Meanwhile, on Monday, the Hamilton County Parks and Recreation Department reported that sections of the Tennessee Riverpark between the rowing center and Scrappy Moore Field had been closed due to standing water over the trails. The trail behind the STEM school is also underwater, according to a Monday morning news release.
Beyond powering parts of seven southeastern states, TVA provides flood control, navigation and land management for the Tennessee River system.
People interested in following TVA’s weather forecasts and lake levels can visit TVA.com, as well as TVA’s Facebook and Twitter feeds.