Forecasts for the Mississippi River at Vicksburg continued to point to an elevated stage through next week, with precautions in place despite a low threat for any actual flooding.

The Mississippi River was 39.8 feet Vicksburg on Saturday, up .36 feet. It’s forecast to crest at 42.5 feet, half a foot below the 43-foot flood stage, on March 28. Levels are predicted to fall below 30 feet by mid-April.

In the past 30 days, rainfall in the Ohio River Valley was about 200 percent above normal, which has spiked stages on the Lower Mississippi River, National Weather Service senior service hydrologist Marty Pope said. Outlooks for the next week aren’t as dramatic, Pope said, which should keep the lower half of the Mississippi at bay.

“We look fairly decent on our crests, with a slight possibility we’ll hit the flood stage,” Pope said. “The only issue here is with our local rain, with 2 to 3 inches this weekend from Greenville to Vicksburg. It’ll cause a pop in the river stage, then ease off.”

Precipitation in the Ohio River Valley is a bellwether for springtime stages on the Lower Mississippi River. Homes and businesses along the Ohio River near Cincinnati flooded in the past week as levels crested just shy of 58 feet, or 6 feet above flood stage there.

Routine precautions to protect Vicksburg’s waterfront began Wednesday when flood warnings were issued for points on the river from here to Baton Rouge.

Workers brought out the rail ties and sealant — now a familiar sight along the waterfront during high water — to close a gap in the floodwall at Crawford Street, near the old Grand Station Casino site. No roads in the city have closed because of the flood advisory.

The city’s flood protection protocol calls for the opening to be closed when the river reaches 39 feet in Vicksburg. Other storm drains on the floodwall are to be closed when the stage reaches 41 feet, also when roads in the Long Lake and Chickasaw communities take on water. Jackson Lane, which sits at the far west end of the Kings community, becomes impassible when the river stage hits 43 feet.

Garnet Van Norman, the city’s public works director, didn’t foresee current predictions prompting additional closures of the eight drain valves along the floodwall. Together, the valves keep water from the Yazoo Diversion Canal from seeping onto Levee Street and nearby low-lying sections of downtown.

“As long as it stays the same, we won’t have to do anything else,” Van Norman said.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Thursday closed the gates at the Steele Bayou Control Structure off Mississippi 465 north of Vicksburg, Vicksburg District spokesman Greg Raimondo said. Levels there Saturday showed nearly equal stages, with the landside at 87.81 feet and the riverside at 87.72 feet. In the past, gates have been closed when water on the riverside is higher than the landside and reopened when levels normalize. Raimondo indicated the Corps closed them out of an abundance of caution.

A crest of 90.5 feet was expected on the landside of the structure, Raimondo said. Crops in the lowest-lying edges of the 4,093-acre Yazoo Backwater Area go under at about 86 feet.

“It’ll probably have a lot of woods and farms flooded,” Raimondo said. “But other than winter wheat, there’s nothing in the ground anyway.”

A longer-range forecast shows a fairly strong El Nino weather pattern across the nation’s midsection, which means rainfall should be heavier in the Deep South than the Ohio Valley, Pope said.

“We’ve been looking at it (the El Nino) strengthening,” Pope said.

In 2011, the Mississippi River at Vicksburg rose above flood stage twice — 43.3 feet on March 31 and the record-smashing 57.1-foot mark reached May 19. In between, specifically during the last two weeks of April, rainfall in the Ohio Valley was measured 600 to 1,000 percent above normal, combining with above-average snowfall in the Upper Midwest earlier that year to cause the record floods.

The May 2011 crest in Vicksburg was nine-tenths of a foot higher than in the previous benchmark flood in 1927.