but officials aren t taking any chances. the associated press reports at least nine airboats and two helicopters are on the way to the area for possible emergency rescues. fargo s mayor talked about the situation less than an hour ago on cnn s american morning. if the forecast stays where they re projected to be, we re in good shape. we finished the sandbagging yesterday, all the sandbags are placed. our earthen dikes should be finished sometime today. then we get into the what we call maintenance mode. and until the river gets back down to, oh, say, 30 feet, it s still we still have some problems, but they re not insurmountable. all right. still have some problems, but this is going to be really dicy next 72 or so hours. meteorologist rob marciano in the severe weather center. we re talking about cresting on sunday. we have a long way to go. we do. then like the mayor said, beyond that they have to pretty much
a lot of anxious people along the red river right now. the river is more than 14 feet above flood stable and it s expected to crest on sunday. rob marciano is watching this for us in the severe weather center. rob? it is expected to crest a couple of feet below the record which was set last year, but that was, you know, a historic record. just to have it crest two feet below that stable isn t really making these folks rest easier. they are confident in fargo because when they got to 40.8 inches of feet last year they were able to hold the river back, for the most part. there was damage to about 100 homes and structures, but for the most part they were able to ballot it back. this forecast will change over the next couple of days for sure. right now sunday afternoon is the crest time, but notice it stays above major flood stable right on through the end of next week. those sandbag and dikes will will be under constant pressure
federal money to help build up dikes and prevent this from happening again, but, you know, the spirit there is so strong both there and in moorehead that they re going out again this week and hopefully they ll make it through the weekend. you know, i ll ask that question of the city official i talked to last hour. at some point it seems the right thing to do would be to provide the extra reinforcements there. do it before it happens. do it before it happens. right. preventive tp we don t talk enough about that. thank you, sir. detroit, a city with high unemployment, a city low in student enrollment and will a boost from stimulus funds fix things. josh levs will break it down here in the cnn newsroom. ally shown 24 hours. for skin that looks and feels truly comfortable. lubriderm®. your moisture matched.
the highway patrol says up to 8 feet of icy water is gathering in roads, in areas along these roads, and in some spots the water is rushing over, so authorities are shutting down parts of some of the highways there saying the conditions are just too dangerous for traffic. these are pictures from fargo. they re taking no chances. crews are working overtime, they re hauling dirt to try to build some dikes there. the sudden melting of the snow combining with this intense rain is pushing the red river above flood stage. forecasters are saying it s expected to crest at 38 feet probably by saturday. j.d. will be along in a couple of minutes to update us. that s why we leave the weather to her, right? jon: and it wasn t your fault. they double scripted us. jane: there you go. [laughter] jon: that s true. this next story not for the faint of heart, protesters taking to the streets of bangkok, thailand. instead of carrying signs, they are carrying jugs full of human blood. thousands of proteste
the storm struck early in the morning, as i said. people woke up, they heard some funny sounds in their houses. they got up and realized that water was suddenly rising. it was something similar to what happened in new orleans, in fact. because sea walls and dikes gave way under the pressure of the storm. 100 mile an hour winds. plus the fact that, in fact, this week, this last week there s been some of the highest tides along the coast that they ever get. the very high tides during the week, those two factors coupled with a very strong low pressure area brought in this storm, and the water just flooded through areas. many places where houses had been built below sea level. when the dikes gave way, they flooded out. sea waters rose up. sometimes six to eight feet in a matter of minutes. jim, i read that there were hurricane force winds felt from portugal on to the netherlands. seeing these pictures, is it a bit of an anomaly, this kind of severe weather in this part of europe? repor