Rising lake levels and the threat of even more rain in the forecast has lead to the closure of the campground at the Cranfield Recreation Area.
Dylan Edwards, the superintendent of the Army Corps of Engineers’ Mountain Home office, says that the Cranfield camping area is closed as of Friday. Would-be campers with reservations began being contacted about the closure Thursday evening, and those already encamped at Cranfield have until Friday afternoon to vacate the site.
At the KTLO, Classic Hits and The Boot studios, the official reporting station in Mountain Home for the National Weather Service, 9.05 inches of rain was recorded in April which makes it the 8th wettest in Mountain Home history. Normal rainfall for April is 4.13 inches, meaning April was 4.92 inches above normal. More rain is expected for the Twin Lakes Area this weekend and through most of next week.
The water level on Norfork Lake on Friday morning was 556.75 feet. That level is up almost 3 feet compared to levels recorded in late April.
“We’ve been watching the water levels, and knowing that more rain was coming we decided to go ahead and close it,” Edwards says.
The Corps has also closed parts of the Robinson Point campground due to the high water level, Edwards says, and expects that the campsite at Henderson may soon be closed as well. The closed campsites will reopen once the lake level recedes.
The electrical system at many of the area’s campsites function on a loop, Edwards says. This means when the Corps has to cut power to some campsites in anticipation of flooding, that also knocks out power on other, drier campsites on that circuit.
“We’ve been holding out as long as we can to allow people to enjoy the sites, but it was time to close it,” Edwards says.
Other Corps sites like Gamaliel and Bidwell Point remain open, he says.
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