Are Lake Okeechobee discharges to the St. Lucie River coming? Weather will decide

Is water pouring through the St. Lucie Lock and Dam a sign of Lake Okeechobee discharges soon to come?

The Army Corps of Engineers opened the dam gates Tuesday and sent about 773 million gallons of water into the St. Lucie River.

To be clear: The water is not from Lake Okeechobee; it's rainfall runoff from land in western Martin County, mostly from farmland, that's collected in the St. Lucie Canal connecting the lake and the river.

"With all the rain that's been falling in recent days, the canal level is rising," Corps spokesman John Campbell said. "The gates (at the dam) will have to stay open to keep it from rising too high. Over the next few weeks, as we get into the start of the rainy season, it won't be unusual to see the gates open and close depending on precipitation events."

The Corps' action could be a "harbinger of Lake O discharges to come," said Mark Perry, executive director of the Florida Oceanographic Society in Stuart.

"If the Corps has to start releasing water with just the rain we've had recently, imagine what will happen if they get caught with the lake too high when the real tropical summer weather comes," Perry said. "They'll say they have no option but to dump it into the estuary."

Lake O rising

In fact, the recent rains are raising Lake O, too: more than a quarter of a foot since Saturday. And the summer rainy season along the Treasure Coast and north of Lake O hasn't officially started yet.

"The lake was receding really well, at least until this past weekend," Campbell said. The possibility of Lake O discharges this summer "all depends on the weather: a combination of how much rain falls, where it falls and how intense it is when it falls."

The short-term forecast "is not favorable," Campbell said. "It calls for rain the rest of the week. Beyond that is hard to say."

The National Weather Service is predicting a normal rainy season this year, said meteorologist Jessie Smith at the agency's Melbourne station, "nothing exceptional, not too wet, not too dry."

During the annual wet season, which typically runs from May 15 to Oct. 15, South Florida usually receives about 36 inches or about 70 percent of its average annual rainfall, according to the weather service.

No crystal ball

Making long-range predictions on discharges is like making long-range weather predictions: Iffy at best.

And history doesn't help.

A year ago, the lake's elevation was 11 feet, 4⅜ inches, more than a foot and a half lower than it was Wednesday. The possibility of discharges seemed nearly impossible until Sept. 6, when the Corps began releasing water from the lake in anticipation of Hurricane Irma.

More: Follow the 2017 Lake O discharges day by day

"Last year, we thought there'd be no releases," Campbell said. "Then Irma hit in September, and it didn't work out that way."

After a brief respite during the storm, the discharges resumed and didn't end until Dec. 28. By that time, about 192 billion gallons of lake water had poured into the St. Lucie.

More: Lake Okeechobee discharges topped 192 billion gallons

For the upcoming hurricane season, the Colorado State University Tropical Meteorology Project predicts a total of 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes. That's slightly above the 30-year average of 12 named storms, six hurricanes and two major hurricanes, but fewer storms than last year.

Two years ago Wednesday, the lake elevation was 13 feet, 8⅝ inches, and discharges already had begun Jan. 30 after a particularly rainy dry season.

By May 19 that year, blue-green algae was blooming in the South Fork of the St. Lucie River; and the summer of 2016 would become infamous for toxic algae blooms.

Discharges that year ended Nov. 4 after 219.6 billion gallons of Lake O water flowed into the St. Lucie.

More: Corps ends 2016 Lake O discharges

Reservoir relief

Every gallon of water pouring into the St. Lucie River is another reason for the proposed reservoir south of Lake O, Perry said.

If the reservoir and other planned projects south of the lake were in place, he said, water could have been moving south to the Everglades and Florida Bay throughout the dry season.

"By now, just before the start of the rainy season, the lake could be a lot lower than it is now," Perry said. "There would be a lot more capacity in the lake to take on the summer rains and not send the water to the estuaries."

More: Reservoir plan submitted to Army Corps



