Historic flooding predicted along Arkansas River

Residents in parts of Arkansas were preparing for what meteorologists on Sunday predicted will be the worst flooding in recorded history along parts of the Arkansas River over the coming week.

The National Weather Service said in the statement that levee "over topping" is likely with "significant impacts to life and property across a very large area."

The Arkansas River reached 38.2 feet (11.6 meters) on Sunday near Fort Smith, Arkansas, surpassing the historic crest of 38.1 (11.6) feet in April 1945.

Flood waters cover the parking area of River Spirit Hotel and Casino on the Arkansas River on Friday, May 24, 2019, in Tulsa, Okla. (Tom GilbertTulsa World via AP)

Spokeswoman Karen Santos said the city of 80,000 residents that's on the border with Oklahoma was in "preparedness and warning mode." She said one home was completely submerged and about 500 homes either have water very close or in them. Authorities predict hundreds more homes and businesses will flood by the time the river crests there Tuesday at 42.5 feet (13 meters).

Across the river from Fort Smith, the tiny town of Moffett, Oklahoma, population about 120, was submerged by Saturday afternoon, Sequoyah County Emergency Management Director Steve Rutherford told the Times Record in Fort Smith.

In downtown Van Buren, Arkansas, just northeast of Fort Smith, Rickey Jones, co-owner of BrokenJoe's Screen Printing, was among several business owners who put sandbags in front of their entrances.

"We're going to be stacking things as high as we can in here, taking out electronics and helping out our neighbors," Jones said.

On Sunday afternoon, a National Guard helicopter was sent to rescue two Army Corps of Engineers workers who had become trapped in a building as the Arkansas River rose, said Arkansas Department of Emergency Management spokeswoman Melody Daniel.

"The river had risen and spread to a point where the lock and dam building itself was no longer accessible by boat or road," said Daniel, who took video of the rescue at the Trimble Lock and Dam, located on the county line of Crawford and Sebastian counties.

She said there were also several road closures due to high water.

The water flowing into the Arkansas River has come from rains in southeast Kansas and northeastern Oklahoma, said National Weather Service meteorologist Willie Gilmore.

"All that water funneled down into the tributaries that go into the Arkansas River," Gilmore said.

In Tulsa, authorities advised residents of some neighborhoods on Sunday to consider leaving for higher ground because the river is stressing the city's old levee system.

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. intelligence officials have determined that Russian President Vladimir Putin likely didn’t order the death of imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny in February, according to an official familiar with the determination.

While U.S. officials believe Putin was ultimately responsible for the death of Navalny, who endured brutal conditions during his confinement, the intelligence community has found “no smoking gun” that Putin was aware of the timing of Navalny's death — which came soon before the Russian president's reelection — or directly ordered it, according to the official.

The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.

Soon after Navalny’s death, U.S. President Joe Biden said Putin was ultimately responsible but did not accuse the Russian president of directly ordering it.

At the time, Biden said the U.S. did not know exactly what had happened to Navalny but that “there is no doubt” that his death “was the consequence of something that Putin and his thugs did.”

Navalny, 47, Russia’s best-known opposition politician and Putin’s most persistent foe, died Feb. 16 in a remote penal colony above the Arctic Circle while serving a 19-year sentence on extremism charges that he rejected as politically motivated.

He had been behind bars since January 2021 after returning to Russia from Germany, where he had been recovering from nerve-agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin.

Russian officials have said only that Navalny died of natural causes and have vehemently denied involvement both in the poisoning and in his death.

In March, a month after Navalny’s death, Putin won a landslide reelection for a fifth term, an outcome that was never in doubt.

The Wall Street Journal first reported about the U.S. intelligence determination.

FILE - Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny gestures while speaking during his interview to the Associated Press in Moscow, Russia on Dec. 18, 2017. U.S. intelligence officials have determined that Russian President Vladimir Putin likely didn't order the death of Navalny, the imprisoned opposition leader, in February of 2024. An official says the U.S. intelligence community has found "no smoking gun" that Putin was aware of the timing of Navalny's death or directly ordered it. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)