Navasota River flooding caused by rainfall, water release from Lake Limestone

BRAZOS COUNTY, Texas (KBTX) – The Navasota River watershed has received anywhere from 3 to 15 inches of rain in the last 7 days, which has caused flooding from the Navasota River into Brazos and Grimes counties.

The flooding was also caused by water released by lake limestone. The water supply reservoir has released 78 billion gallons of water in the last 7 days.

The Brazos River Authority described Lake Limestone filling up like 100,000 beach balls flowing into the lake every second.

In order to manage the reservoir’s water level, they had to release water from the dam. That water along with heavy rainfall flowed into the Navasota River.

They said the flooding that occurred from the Navasota River was a historic event.

The Brazos River Authority Water Services Manager, Aaron Abel, said that since Lake Limestone has been operating since 1978, they have never seen that amount of water flow into Lake Limestone.

“This was a historic event along the Navasota River both in the upper portions of the Navasota River watershed and obviously further downstream in Grimes and Brazos County,” said Abel.

Since Lake Limestone reached its water level peak at 363 feet on Thursday, they released roughly 240,000 acre-feet of water from the dam.

“For reference, the volume of Lake Limestone is about 203,000 acre-feet. So Lake Limestone could have been completely empty, and it would have filled up, and we would have had to still release water,” said Abel.

However, Abel says that when rain occurs like this, flooding is not surprising.

“And that’s typical of River basins when you move farther and farther east into Texas,” said Abel.

The Brazos River Authority says it could potentially take a week or longer for water levels to recede and get back to normal.