Flood stage is the point at which the surface of a
riverA river is a natural watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing toward an ocean, a lake, a sea or another river. In a few cases, a river simply flows into the ground or dries up completely before reaching another body of water...
,
creekA stream is a flowing body of water with a current, confined within a bed and stream banks. Depending on its locale or certain characteristics, a stream may be referred to as a branch, brook, beck, burn, creek, kill, lick, rill, river syke, bayou, rivulet, or run...
, or other body of water has risen to a sufficient level to cause damage or affects use of man-made structures. When a body of water rises to this level, it is considered a
floodA flood is an overflow or accumulation of an expanse of water that submerges land. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide....
event.
Flood stage means a manmade feature is underwater. The term refers to the general condition in which a water level is high enough to cause flooding or water damage to man made elements near a body of water.
Flood stage is the point at which the surface of a
riverA river is a natural watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing toward an ocean, a lake, a sea or another river. In a few cases, a river simply flows into the ground or dries up completely before reaching another body of water...
,
creekA stream is a flowing body of water with a current, confined within a bed and stream banks. Depending on its locale or certain characteristics, a stream may be referred to as a branch, brook, beck, burn, creek, kill, lick, rill, river syke, bayou, rivulet, or run...
, or other body of water has risen to a sufficient level to cause damage or affects use of man-made structures. When a body of water rises to this level, it is considered a
floodA flood is an overflow or accumulation of an expanse of water that submerges land. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide....
event.
Definition
Flood stage means a manmade feature is underwater. The term refers to the general condition in which a water level is high enough to cause flooding or water damage to man made elements near a body of water. It applies only to a highly localized point, and not to any standard reference point such as the height of a riverbank, and does not refer to the height above the normal level of a body of water.
The term often confuses the public because it is misunderstood and misused in number of ways. It is often confused with the term "flood gage" which measures the actual height of water above the normal non-flood high point of a body of water, which may not cause any damage or flooding to manmade features.
The term flood stage refers to flood water levels that actually flood or damage man-made features.
Usual and customary usage is to apply the term within a specific, usually small, rural community that has some low lying road or structure that is the first to flood. It is common practice for a local official to place a measuring stick at that location, and to report back to the community as the water height rises above that point. It provides a local reference point commonly understood in a localized community, and gives citizens an easily understood numerical measure of how high a flood is at a point in time. It is usually measured at a specific location to inform locals about when roads are flooded ("at flood stage"), and how deep the water is at those spots (flood stage is 2 feet on Maple Street at First Avenue). The numerical measure always refers to how deep the water is above a road surface or other manmade feature such as the top of a dam.
The phrase "At flood stage" normally means the water level is just at the point where it causes either flooding of roads or water damage impacting man-made features.
Another example of usage is " flood stage is 10 feet", meaning the water level is 10 ft above the first point at which is was "at flood stage" causing flooding of roads or water damage. The associated depth provides a flood water depth that can be used to make judgements about driving a car or tractor through that point or driving a detour around it.
The term flood stage can be referring to different water heights even at adjoining properties next to the same water body depending on what water height is causing flooding of roads or structures on either property. So one could say "flood stage is at 20 ft" at one property and "flood stage at 5 feet" at an adjoining property at the same moment, when the actual height of the water is exactly the same.
During newsworthy flood events, Media reporters are often asked to find out "how high is the water?" , who may then ask a local official, who may say to the reporter: "the flood stage is 10 feet". Misunderstanding this to mean a generalized water elevation, a reporter may then report to the flood stage to wider audiences in other locations, to whom it means only that there is flooding somewhere. During major floods such as on the Mississippi River, flood stage numbers reported by media usually refer to the water depth above the top of specific levees and embankments, and not the height of water above normal water levels.
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