Iowa braces for flooding with more rain on the way

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) - Volunteers filled sandbags and homeowners began moving things out of their basements on Saturday, and one small town evacuated about 100 homes in preparation for flooding along the Cedar River in Iowa.

The river is expected to crest Tuesday in Cedar Rapids, Iowa's second largest city with a population of about 130,000. But with more rain expected Saturday night, officials there warned people to evacuate downtown areas of the city near the river by 8 p.m. Sunday.

"We have emergency personnel that can help you if needed," Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett said Saturday. "They'll risk their lives for you. But we don't want them to risk their lives."

Volunteers and city workers place sandbags along the dike between the Cedar River and the water treatment plant in Cedar Falls, Iowa, Saturday, Sept. 24, 2016. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream, while a Wisconsin town was recovering from storms. (Brandon Pollock/The Courier via AP)

At the Cedar Valley Montessori School in downtown Cedar Rapids on Friday, about 100 volunteers from area high schools helped move all the school equipment above the ground floor.

Stacy Cataldo, head of the Montessori school, told television station KCRG that many remember how flooding damaged the school in 2008 and don't want that to happen again.

<strong>"We're applying those lessons as we move forward," she said.</strong>

<b>Just upriver in the small town of Palo, about 100 homes in low-lying areas were evacuated Saturday.</b>

City Clerk Trisca Dix told The Associated Press that the mandatory evacuation in the town of about 1,000 took place Saturday afternoon before the river was expected to crest Sunday night at 24.5 feet.

Mayor Tom Yock told the Des Moines Register that volunteers and work crews scrambled Saturday to protect as much as possible of the town, which was devastated by record flooding in 2008.

Many people moved their belongings to the upper levels of their homes and built sandbag barriers before evacuating, he said.

"We're just trying to be more proactive than we were in '08, trying to save as many homes as we can," Yock said.

In Cedar Falls, about 55 miles (90 kilometers) upriver from Cedar Rapids, Lynn Hoth was among a group of volunteers who spent Friday filling sandbags and building flood barriers.

"Last time, we were an island for three days and we couldn't get in or out," Hoth told KCRG, referring to the catastrophic flood of 2008, which caused billions of dollars in damage. This time around, "we've had notice, so that's good, and people help each other."

In southeastern Minnesota, roads were reopening Saturday as floodwater receded. But north of Minneapolis, parts of Highway 169 remained closed in both directors because of flooding.

Parts of southern Minnesota will remain under a flood warning until Monday morning. In central Wisconsin, a flood warning was issued for the Yellow River at Babcock until Sunday morning, but the river wasn't causing any major problems, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Rick Mamrosh in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

In southwestern Wisconsin, the Kickapoo River appeared to have crested and the Black River was on its way down. But the Yellow River is still rising and may reach major flood stage Sunday evening, said Clint Aegerter, a meteorologist at the weather service's office in La Crosse, Wisconsin. The Mississippi River at La Crosse may crest at minor flood stage around 4 p.m. Monday, he said.

Still, the weather service said storms Saturday night into Sunday would bring more rain to the area.

Another meteorologist in the La Crosse office, Todd Rieck, said a half-inch to 1 inch of rain is possible in southwestern Wisconsin, southeastern Minnesota and northeastern Iowa late Saturday through Sunday.

"If you even got an inch in most locations, it would result in further flooding problems," Rieck said. "There's no place for the water to go."

In Cedar Rapids, officials said those residents who have been asked to evacuate should plan to remain out of their homes and businesses for up to a week. A curfew was also to go into effect Sunday beginning at 8 p.m.

They had some good news, too: The Cedar River is expected to crest at 24.5 feet on Tuesday, which is nearly a foot lower than they earlier projected.

Fire Chief Mark English asked the curious to stay out of the flooded areas, noting that some heavy equipment used to build earthen dams and erect flood barriers has been hindered by gawkers. He said an estimated 1,500 properties near the river are expected to get at least some flooding.

Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad and other state officials were set to tour flood-damaged areas Saturday in the Cedar River basin.

Tom Moffitt stands on his deck as he looks at the flood waters on Friday, Sept. 23, 2016, in Shell Rock, Iowa. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream, while a Wisconsin town was recovering from storms. (Brian Powers/The Des Moines Register via AP )

Flood waters from the Cedar River cover Highway 57 east of downtown Cedar Falls, Iowa, Saturday, Sept. 24, 2016. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream, while a Wisconsin town was recovering from storms. (Brandon Pollock/The Courier via AP)

Tom Moffit survey's the flood waters filling his house and street on Friday, Sept. 23, 2016, in Shell Rock, Iowa. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream, while a Wisconsin town was recovering from storms. (Brian Powers/The Des Moines Register via AP )

Volunteers fill sandbag in the New Bohemia District of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on Friday, Sept. 23, 2016. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream, while a Wisconsin town was recovering from storms now blamed for two deaths. (David Scrivner/Iowa City Press-Citizen via AP)

Jason Mann, of Cedar Rapids, loads sandbags onto a truck in the New Bohemia District of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on Friday, Sept. 23, 2016. Authorities in several Iowa cities were mobilizing resources Friday to handle flooding from a rain-swollen river that has forced evacuations in several communities upstream, while a Wisconsin town was recovering from storms now blamed for two deaths. (David Scrivner /Iowa City Press-Citizen via AP)

The new Smithsonian Institution National Museum of African American History and Culture is filled with artifacts that illustrate the African-American journey in the United States

WASHINGTON (AP) - The new Smithsonian Institution National Museum of African American History and Culture is filled with artifacts that illustrate the African-American journey in the United States. There are so many important things inside the museum that seeing them all in a single visit would be a challenge. Several exhibits that museum visitors may want to see in their first visit: ___ The Tennessee State University Marching band performs on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Friday, Sept. 23, 2016, as part of the entertainment for a reception at the White House for the opening of the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh) ANGOLA PRISON TOWER The 21-foot guard tower and a cell from the Louisiana State Penitentiary prison called "Angola" is one of two items that were installed before the museum was built around them. The prison is known by the name of the plantation that once stood on the land it occupies. Angola prison officially opened in 1901 and is currently one of the largest maximum security prisons in the country. The cell in the exhibit was built on top of the old slave quarters at the prison. ___ SEGREGATION-ERA RAILROAD CAR The second item installed before the museum was fully built is a 44-seat Southern Railway passenger coach car. It had separate seating for whites and blacks as it traveled through Florida, Georgia, Kentucky and Tennessee, and has been preserved to help explain the Jim Crow laws in the South that were used to oppress African-Americans. ___ SOUTH CAROLINA SLAVE CABIN This two-room cabin was used to house slaves on the Point of Pines Plantation on Edisto Island, South Carolina. While such cabins are not rare - especially in the South, where the majority of slaves were kept in the United States - this cabin was on an abandoned cotton plantation, where the slaves declared themselves free after the Union army invaded and occupied it. Curators disassembled the 160-year-old cabin and reassembled it board by board in the museum. ___ TUSKEGEE AIRMEN TRAINING PLANE Suspended from the museum's ceiling is one of the World War II-era planes used to train Tuskegee Airmen, African-Americans who participated in the Army Air Corps program on learning to fly and maintain combat aircraft. The PT-13 Stearman open-cockpit biplane was decommissioned in 1946, bought at a public auction, restored and flown to Washington to be placed in the museum. More than 900 black pilots trained at Tuskegee Institute, an all-black segregated facility in Alabama, during World War II. They were lauded for their stellar record flying escort for bombing missions in Europe and Africa. ___ EMMITT TILL'S CASKET The glass-topped casket in which lynching victim Emmitt Till was first buried is one of the museum's most powerful artifacts. The 14-year-old African-American boy from Chicago was killed during a summer visit to Money, Mississippi, for allegedly whistling at a white woman. Till's body was so mutilated that his family was only able to identify him by the initials on a ring he wore. His mother, Mamie Till Mobley, requested an open-casket funeral for her son, so the world could see what his Southern white attackers had done. His death became a rallying cry for the civil rights movement. After an exhumation, his body was placed in a new casket. ___ ARTIFACTS FROM THE SLAVE SHIP SAO JOSE The S⭠Jos矐aquete de Africa was one of thousands of ships that brought slaves out of Africa, bound for North and South America. It sank off the coast of South Africa in 1794 while carrying more than 400 enslaved people from Mozambique. More than 200 slaves are thought to have died in the tragedy. The museum will display a wooden pulley from the ship, and iron ballast blocks that were used to counterbalance the weight of the African cargo on board. The artifacts are among only a few items ever recovered from a ship that sank with enslaved people aboard. ___ Jesse J. Holland covers race and ethnicity for The Associated Press. Contact him at jholland@ap.org, on Twitter at website or on Facebook at website to see inside new Smithsonian black history museum