The combination of heavy rainfall and melting snow triggered the National Weather Service to issue a flood watch for most of western and coastal Maine that will remain in effect through Monday afternoon.

Stacie Hanes, a meteorologist with the weather service, said Sunday night that the melting snow and ice could cause some of the state’s largest rivers — the Androscoggin, Saco and Kennebec — to reach flood stage on Monday.

“It has been raining all over the state today and it is melting the snow,” Hanes said.

Hanes said Portland got almost an inch of rain on Sunday and could expect to see another inch fall Sunday night into Monday morning. The National Weather Service, in its flood watch notification, said the additional rain combined with stormwater runoff and snow melt could cause rivers, streams and creeks to flood in urban areas.

The weather service also issued a coastal flooding weather advisory for York and Cumberland counties. That advisory was for the early morning hours on Monday. The advisory warned that an astronomical high tide combined with gale-force winds could cause flooding.

There were no reports of flooding on Sunday in the downtown areas of Augusta, Gardiner and Hallowell, but the Kennebec County Emergency Management Agency director, Richard Beausoleil, said the flood threat could heighten on Monday.

“We’re just keeping an eye on things,” Beausoleil told the Kennebec Journal.

Dennis Hoey can be contacted at 791-6365 or at:dhoey@pressherald.com


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